Eulogy For Home
by canebrake
Summary: (AU, canon-verse) For Astrid, growing up on Fogg Island was a bit of a nightmare. But when Astrid is forced to flee her home after the death of her chief, she realizes the life of a drifter isn't all that better. Alone with no one but her new dragon friend, Astrid is more than miserable: that is, until she meets a certain Hiccup Haddock and his Berk crew.
1. Chapter 1

warning: murder & attempted assault occur in this chapter

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eulogy for home

part one / / fear is a superpower

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Astrid was certain she was the only one on the island that actually _enjoyed_ the weather.

As far as Viking tribes went, there weren't many further south than the Smelly Scoundrels. Fogg Island was a strange, _sticky_ anomaly (as far as summer was concerned) with air so thick she could practically drink it. When winter came, Astrid resigned to thick furs and numb toes. But for a few glorious weeks of the year, she reveled in the way her hair plastered to her forehead and how her sweat slicked her skin, how it made it salty as the sea. The weather was, dare she say, kinda sorta _warm._ She refused to do any other work other than fish during the summer. From dawn to dusk she was on their dock repairing boats, sails, and nets, before she took off to drown in a breeze that didn't chap her skin absolutely raw.

But today it was _raining._ And while rain made the air stickier and more to her liking, it made fishing and sailing conditions unpleasant and often impossible. Astrid could hear the rain the moments she woke up, a pitter patter against her window and decided a personal day was in order. But that meant she needed to move fast, before her grandparents got up and gave her more advice on how to be a respectable young lady of Viking society.

Bleh.

Ironically enough, she chose a dress to wear that morning. She liked to keep her pants and shirts clean for fishing, and she got a certain satisfaction out of ruining the hem of every dress she owned by trekking through the mud. The blue fabric was large and bulky as she slipped it on, her waist only appearing when she tied a spare piece of leather right underneath her bust. Astrid wove her hair in a loose, messy braid before she abandoned the idea of the front door entirely. She opened her window, reached for her axe-

Empty space. It wasn't there.

Damn. Bugeyes still had it.

She let out a heavy breath, her dress gaping a hole at the front as her chest concaved, then filled with air once more. Fingers drummed against the splintering wood of her window frame as she weighed her options.

She really, _really_ wanted her axe.

Bugeyes it was.

As Astrid trekked through her sleepy village, she enjoyed the solitude. In summary, the Smelly Scoundrels were a bunch of lazy muttonheads. No one really got up early these days unless there was a sign of danger or a battle cry for war. Their chief wasn't the most agreeable man: all Astrid's life it seemed her people were picking fights with someone or something but as for now? Nothing. They were due for another pointless war though. It was only a matter of time.

It was only a matter of time for a lot of things, she supposed.

But, if there was one person who woke up earlier than her it was Bugeyes. He was Fogg's best blacksmith, even if no one else realized it. He was 14, and only an apprentice, but Astrid had seen his work, seen what he was capable of. Old Man Muck had nothing on his craftsmanship. Not that anyone on Fogg cared about craftsmanship.

But at least Bugeyes made sneaking weaponry easier for her.

The forge was already heated up when she got there. He was tinkering away with something she didn't recognize. His face was covered in one of his own inventions-scopes for his eyes to see better, made from glass that gave his eyes the very bug-like quality he was named for. The strap that held them in place around his head was a little loose and Astrid had a desire to _snap it,_ but she learned that lesson months ago. They both had scars from the sparks that flew when she snuck up on him last. So she waited for him to finish.

"Hey, Astrid," he eventually greeted as he set his hammer aside and wiped his brow with a dirty sleeve. She could see the grime in his blonde bangs, a color only slightly darker than her own hair. "Your axe is ready, it's round back. Just go grab it."

A genuine smile tugged at her lips as she slipped past him to head to weapons storage. Bugeyes always hid her axe behind an old piece of wood in the back so no one would find it. Sharp, clean, and the handle a little worn like she liked it, Astrid twirled it in her hand and headed back to the front of the forge.

Astrid couldn't afford to pay Bugeyes for his work. She wanted to, he _deserved_ her money, but she simply didn't have any. And Bugeyes, bless his soul, didn't care. Not entirely. He accepted other types of payments. Fighting lessons, extra fish, or even a piece of gossip she had picked up in town usually did the trick. Today she decided to go with the latter. "Boats should be due back any day."

This wasn't gossip, and Bugeyes knew this. He regarded her with a look beyond his years that she supposed was to make her feel like a foolish, young girl, before he went back to hammering at a sword. "Eagerly awaiting Gout's sail home, yeah?"

He was just teasing, she knew this, but it still grated on every nerve she had these days. With a small scowl, Astrid gripped her axe a little tighter and eyed nothing in particular behind him. "I hope he gets lost," she pouted, with all the petulance of a child.

Bugeyes smirked; he didn't like Gout, either. Astrid had a hard time coming up with a list with anyone who _did._ "That's cruel." Bugeyes shook his head. "He could end up on another village's island and then _they'd_ have to deal with him."

Like she cared. "Better them than me."

A shrug. "You gotta admit: he's at least better than the chief."

She could admit that to herself. Anyone on this island was better than the chief. But just because Gout wasn't the tyrannical, red-faced, barbaric leader that his father was didn't make him a _tolerable_ human being. He was annoying.

Astrid lifted her chin a bit, grinding her molars. "That doesn't mean I want to marry him," she admitted, a far better admission than the one Bugeyes was fishing for.

He stopped what he was doing and looked up at her, bug eyes even wider behind those silly glasses. "You're marrying _Gout?"_

"I heard Scab talking about it," she shrugged, trying to play it off like a meaningless piece of gossip. "She heard it from her dad that the chief and my grandfather are going to talk contracts when Gout and them all return."

Bugeyes scoffed before he lifted his hammer and took a particularly hard swing to his work. The forge echoed loudly and sparks flew at her feet. "I hope he gets lost," he grumbled.

The scowl on Astrid's face relaxed, as well as she grip on her axe, and she set it aside and out of the way. "Careful," she warned playfully, "Without Gout here, you'd probably have to marry _me_ one day."

He flushed, refusing to look her in the eye. "I really dodged a hammer strike there, didn't I?" he teased, ducking on instinct when Astrid went to thump him on the head. When he was certain she wouldn't go for a second hit, he straightened, wiping his brow once more. "But the future chief's wife, that's not so bad, is it?"

Theoretically, she supposed it was. Being _a_ chief's wife had its perks: best home, best food, and best clothes. But being _Gout's_ wife sounded like a nightmare above all else. Take all the wifely things she'd have to do, like having Grout's grubby snot-nosed children, and add her inevitable loss of complete autonomy and sanity, and Astrid really _really_ wished that Gout would get lost at sea.

All in all, it was very upsetting to think about. So she tried not to. His question she dubbed rhetorical went unanswered.

Astrid's eyes focused back on Bugeyes, the scopes on his eyes distracting and mesmerizing. It was the only thing she'd ever seen him make that wasn't some kind of weapon. This time, she didn't ignore the itch to reach over and snap the strap holding them to his face.

He caught her hand right before she got her fingers underneath the leather. "I'm working with very hot metal. Don't."

Reluctantly, she pulled her hand away, poking at one of the rims of the scopes before she kept her hands to herself. "Do you ever make anything else?"

"What, other than swords and axes? I can make maces."

She shook her head. "No, I meant….do you make other things that aren't weapons? Like the scopes?"

Bugeyes frowned, fiddling with the contraption with two fingers as he sets his hammer down completely. "I only made these to see detail when I'm working." He took them off and handed them to her to see, as if she needed proof that they're makeshift and sloppy out of necessity. "It wasn't for fun."

Her expression mirrored his, one of confusion. As soon as she put them on her face her head instantly ached and she ripped them off with sour look. "But do you make anything just because?" She handed them back.

"We don't have a lot of spare metal; I can't make stuff _just_ _because_."

Astrid wasn't deterred. "It doesn't have to be metal. Maybe wood? It's not like the forest is short on trees. You know, Gnat has these carvings-"

His face hardened instantly at the name and he picks up the hammer again, sparks exploding in the forge in seconds. "I don't want to hear it."

"Bug-"

"No," he said firmly, swinging the hammer one last time with a heavy thud. His posture sagged with the effort and he winced, rolling his left shoulder a few times before he turned his back to her, fiddling with some other villager's order. "Maybe you should go practice," he suggested. "Red and Finn both said they'd be around early to pick up their things. Don't want to get caught, right?"

She'd upset him. He was kicking her out, nicely. The rain outside had dwindled into a light sprinkle which meant that _maybe_ the fisherman would try going out. At the least, they'd spend the day repairing the boats and she did not want to do that. So, maybe he was right. She'd practice. "Yeah, okay," she grumbled, grabbing her axe with both hands. "Bye, Bugs."

He looked up briefly. "…Have a nice day, Astrid," he whispered and she gave a reluctant smile. Bugeyes had never gotten so upset with her that he didn't say goodbye.

The walk to the forest was always a long one. Fogg Island was pretty big, but not many Vikings really went beyond the actual village, not unless they wanted to go the springs or get more firewood. So, every time that Astrid wanted to practice her axe throwing and whatnot, she passed the springs, and main forest and kept going. Eventually, the forest would get so thick that one could get lost if they didn't know the way. Luckily, though, someone had carved small designs in the trees over the years to help keep one on the path: First there was a bumblebee, then an ant, then a beetle, and finally, a butterfly.

Astrid spared Gnat's house one glance before she continued the short walk up to her secret practice meadow.

The fog was particularly thick on Fogg that day; almost too thick to throw anything. But Astrid gave it her best shot anyhow. She probably chucked her axe into the same tree about two dozen times before she was already sick of it. The humidity was eating her alive. She felt like a cloud full of water. It rolled down the back of her neck and soaked the collar of her already soaked dress. The rain was starting to pick up and she was suddenly both overheated and cold, a sweaty mess with chattering teeth in the middle of the forest. Her arms felt heavy yet her lungs felt light and she just wanted to run, but where to—

Thunder rolled somewhere along the horizon as the fog started to clear with the wind. She lifted her head to the sky, embracing the rain as it fell heavier against her cheeks and matted her hair to her head.

The rain was loud, but it wasn't loud enough to disguise a clunking against a tree trunk. Astrid lowered her head and turned around to see Gnat standing there with a walking staff, decked out in some kind of attachable cover that kept the rain off her. She beckoned Astrid to come over and she obeyed, dragging her axe through the mud.

Gnat looked amused, but she didn't say anything. Gnat _never_ said anything; in all the times that Astrid has seen her over the past years, she'd never spoken a word. No one in the village knew what her voice even sounded like anymore, nor did they care. She technically wasn't a part of the village anymore; whether it was by choice or by force, Astrid wasn't sure.

She led Astrid back to her home, a little hut nestled between two trees and semi-hidden in a bunch of ferns. It was incredibly small with a terrible roof, but it felt…warm, despite the isolation of it all. The façade of her home was adorned in the same carvings on the trees that led her up here: bees, ants, beetles and butterflies. She supposed gnats were too small and difficult to carve.

Astrid had only been in Gnat's home once, and that was three years ago when she first started to practice her weaponry constantly: a mishap with her sword let to a nasty cut on her leg. Gnat had seen her limping on her way back to the village, pulled her aside, and fixed her right up, good as new. Their village didn't have a designated healer after their elder Agnes died; a few women here and there knew enough to fill her place, but it seemed Gnat alone had all the herbs and supplies to fix any illness or wound a village could have.

Maybe being alone for ten years forced one to learn all this stuff.

The place looked the same as it did before; whittled carvings littered half her shelves and walls while pottery, plates, and bowls filled the other. One wall was completely dedicated to all of Gnat's weapons: an axe, a mace, two swords, a shield, two bows and _countless_ knives and arrows. But unlike all the others in Astrid's village, she didn't use furs for decorations up on the walls or doors. The only ones she had were lining her winter clothes or being used as blankets for a bed.

Astrid took a seat on the floor by her hearth, fiddling with the hem of her skirt and wrapping her arms around herself in a poor attempt to get warmer. Gnat busied herself making what looked like some sort of broth, which made Astrid excited. She had skipped out the house that morning without eating anything.

Whatever Gnat handed her in the end was delicious. The broth's warmth spread from her chest to the rest of her body and after a few minutes, Astrid could hardly remember that she had been damp and cold. "Thanks…" She mumbled when Gnat took her bowl away with a gentle smile. For a moment, she considered asking what was in the broth, but it wasn't like Astrid was much of a cook anyhow. All she knew was how to fry fish. "How are you?" she asked instead.

Gnat took her hand and waved it back and forth in a gesture of "meh," her nose scrunched in mild distaste as she pointed to a small bucket in the corner that was collecting water from a leak in her roof. The noise was kind of bothersome. Astrid let out a breathy laugh and curled further into herself and closer to the fire. "I could fix your roof," Astrid finally offered, teeth still chattering a bit. "I'd have to sneak out some supplies, but—"

With a soft shake of her head, Gnat buried that idea six feet under.

Astrid sighed. "I promise I can be sneaky. No one will even know I took anything," she pressed. "You're sure you don't need _any_ help?"

Again, Gnat pointed to the bucket.

"The bucket isn't a long term solution." Astrid played with her soiled hem. "But fine. Have fun fixing your soggy roof by yourself."

Gnat grinned and Astrid could see her teeth, straighter and whiter than the average Scoundrel. After she fitted a spare fur from her bed around Astrid's shoulders, she made herself her own bowl of broth as they listened to the rain slowly let up until the drips in Gnat's bucket were faint, sporadic drops of water.

The broth was still warm in her belly when she decided to leave. She could feel Gnat's eyes following her as she placed the furs back near her bed and headed to the door. There was a tap on her shoulder and Astrid whirled around to see Gnat holding a bottle of….sludge.

At her questioning expression, Gnat rolled her shoulder, pointed to Astrid's shoulder, and then at her axe. It was for her muscles and sore shoulder, the one that always ached after she threw her axe around for the first time in a good while.

"Oh," Astrid whispered as Gnat gently shoved the bottle in her hand, wrapping her hand around it in forced acceptance. "Thanks. You can always tell, can't you?"

She shrugged before nodding at the door.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm going." She popped the door open with her good shoulder as she held her axe in one hand and the ointment in the other. "You owe me throwing lessons though, don't forget it."

Another shrug, only this time it was accompanied by that pretty smile, a smile that Astrid stared at until it disappeared behind the door.

With a heavy sigh, Astrid slumped over, her axe wedging itself in the mud. She could already feel her shoulder starting to ache and it felt heavy, as heavy as her desire to not go home any time soon. Honestly, she'd rather sleep in the cold mud than go home and face the possibility that Gout had returned.

She took her sweet time to get back to the village, and it was well past high noon when she returned. Her eyes caught sight of the docks below—they were as empty as she left them, to her relief.

The village was bustling with more people when she returned, so she hid her axe behind the forge like she always did before she scampered through the middle of the village. With her soaked dress and mud-ridden hem, Astrid stuck out like a sore thumb, but the others were used to this kind of appearance from her. If she wasn't covered in mud, she smelled like fish and sweat, her hair tossed from the winds when she was on her boat. Astrid was as ostracized as it came without _actually_ being excommunicated, which was kind of a sweet spot in her opinion. But it did make her wonder.

What did Gnat _do_ that made her escape miles away from the village?

"Astrid!"

She turned her head and saw Scab jogging towards her, a basket of linens under one arm. A smaller basket of needles lay on top and for the umpteenth time, Astrid thought about asking to borrow them to try her own hand at sewing. "What's up, Scab?"

Her breath was haggard as she leaned over, one hand on her knee. The basket was still tucked to her hip. "Where have you _been?"_

This was new. Usually Astrid could get away without episode, the exception being her grandparents. No one else usually cared that she was gone for hours. Something must have happened. "Something the matter?"

Scab set the basket down before she reached for Astrid's arm and tugged her aside, away from prying gazes and sensitive ears. "It's official," she whispered, her eyes a little wild and twitchy, a strange trait she had when she was nervous or excited. The rest of her would stay still but her eyes would never still.

Immediately, Astrid's heart sunk straight down to her feet and her stomach churned. Somehow, she knew exactly what she meant. "The marriage contract?" she asked, hoping she was wrong.

Scab gave a reluctant nod. "The chief just asked me and my mom to make your wedding dress."

This was her worst nightmare. What was a rumor, something that she could pretend would never happen, was coming to fruition right in front of her. "You have got to be kidding me."

"I wish I was."

"What about Gout, he's not even back-"

"Apparently, he gave his consent before he left. That or…" she took a deep breath. "The chief just doesn't care. And you know that could very well be the case."

Astrid swore.

"Listen, I'm right there with you," Scab looked strangely…sympathetic. It wasn't one of her stronger traits. "Can I come with you tomorrow?"

"On my boat?" she rubbed at her eyes, suddenly exhausted even though it was only just past noon. "It's not my turn to go out and fish, I'm just doing maintenance tomorrow."

"We're going to go fishing anyway," Scan insisted. "I'll help you fix the boat or whatever just…" Scab closed her twitching eyes and took a deep breath. "Go home, _stay_ home, and then wake up early and go to the docks. I'll meet you there. Just whatever you do, avoid town. People are going to give their congratulations."

Astrid swore again, rubbing more deliberately at her eyes. Whatever anyone said, she wasn't crying. "We don't want that."

"No, you don't," Scab sighed. "Just….get out of here, yeah? I'll bring your axe home later."

Her head snapped up in shock and she readied herself with an excuse. "What are you-"

"I know everything that's anything, Astrid," she said gently, flicking her brown hair behind her shoulder. "Don't know exactly where you go, but I know you're out there chucking that axe."

Fear gripped her. "Does-"

"No one else knows, not that I know of." She paused and looked behind Astrid, eyes unfocused. "Old Man Muck is coming this way, I'd leave now. He's going to bombard you about babies, I can sense it."

Astrid fisted her dress in her hands and nodded. "Thanks."

Her fingers were still fisted in her dress as she walked back to her house, intent on giving her grandparents a good screaming at. Astrid kept her head high and her eyes dead ahead and it managed to scare off any villager who wanted to talk about the news. When Astrid Hofferson got that look in her eye, everyone knew to steer clear.

"Grandfather!" Astrid yelled as she entered her house. She made sure to slam the door loudly behind her. "Why did I have to hear from _Scab_ that I'm getting married? Shouldn't I be the first to know these things?" Her face contorted into a snarl as she fiddled with the leather sash underneath her belt. It was suddenly too tight and heavy, weighed down with rainwater as she stood in the threshold of their home, her dress dripping a puddle by her feet. She kicked off her shoes. "I swear to all that is good on this green island if I'm actually engaged to _Gout-"_

Astrid walked into the next room and saw her grandparents seated at their kitchen table, the Chief resting on the other side. A man she didn't recognize stood in the corner looking out the window, his back to her.

"Oh," she mumbled, anger making way for fear that essentially knotted her tongue. "Hello, Chief Clout."

Chief Clout was a terrifying man in more ways than one. He was six feet even with an ugly goatee and an even uglier braid that fell all the way down his back. All of his features were dark: his hair, his eyes, his clothes. The pinkish, freckled skin of his arms and face was the only thing that made him look anything like a Viking. His face rested in a permanent scowl unless his dumbass son had made some mediocre accomplishment and then he would smirk, looking unsavory and diabolical. The adults in her village revered him. Men boasted of his warrior skills and women fawned over his strength and large muscles, but every single child in the village was afraid of him. Astrid had not seen one baby that didn't burst into tears upon sight of him.

All in all, Astrid did not want him as a father-in-law, perks be damned.

"Good Afternoon, Astrid." Even his voice was unappealing. It had a harsh quality to it, like he was always about to yell, even though he rarely did.

She waited for Chief Clout to fill in the gaps of what she didn't know but he never did. "Scab is right," her grandmother finally said. "The chief has chosen you to marry his son. Isn't that an honor?"

Technically it was. Everyone could recognize it. But everyone could also recognize that this was a miserable arrangement for Astrid, and her grandmother was no exception. She was trying and succeeded to put up a front in front of the chief, and Astrid figured she owed her family to try and do the same.

"Yes," she said quietly. "Very much so."

She'd figure a way to get out of this later. She would.

She had to.

The giant of a man in the corner turned his head, lending an ear to the conversation but he still didn't turn around.

"When's the wedding?" Astrid asked, hoping that maybe she had another year or two to wrap her head around all this.

She didn't like the answer. "End of summer."

That was in _three weeks._ "So soon? Are you….are you sure that's a good idea?"

It was a dangerous game to question the Chief's decisions, especially when you were a woman. Sure, Astrid got away with a lot of things since her parents had died and she had no brothers or uncles to help take care of her grandparents, but even she wasn't immune to such social faux paus.

Clout stared at her before nodding slowly. "I'm sure. My son deserves a beauty such as yourself." She felt violated with his eyes on her. "I'll have someone bring some mutton over to help fatten her up." What the hell was she, a boar? "She's a little small; it's not very good for bearing children."

Astrid was almost eighteen years old, well past the age for bearing children, but that didn't mean she liked the idea of motherhood so soon. Goodness, she could be _pregnant_ in a month. The thought almost had her gagging. "Children?" she echoed weakly.

"My son will be chief soon. In a few years when I pass the job to him, I'd like him to have a few children by then, and certainly a son."

Multiple children? In just a couple of years? Astrid's whole body ached at the thought and she screwed her mouth shut. Better not to say anything at all.

"We understand," her grandfather intervened. "That would be very kind of you, sir. Thank you."

The chief grunted and while the conversation seemed pretty much over, he didn't make any move to get up. Astrid focused past him to the mysterious man who finally turned around and _shit,_ was he ugly: a taller, more _evil_ version of the chief himself. Suddenly she felt watched and hunted.

"Hello?" she said, looking to her grandparents for an explanation. They looked as bewildered as she was. "Are you a friend of the chief's?"

"Business associate," Clout grunted. "He needs boats. Isak and his men make the finest south of the archipelago." That was true. Everyone at the trading posts always said Fogg's boats were the best around.

But the man looked like there was something else on his mind. "Young girl," he said, his voice as sinister as she imagined, "Have you ever seen a dragon?"

Astrid blinked. She was not expecting that. "No? I mean, I've heard of them." She'd seen carvings of them at Gnat's house and she thought that _maybe_ she'd seen one in the sky before, but it might have been her imagination. "But I've never seen one. No dragon has ever come here….right?" she looked to at the others for clarification. Had there been dragon sightings? Was her island going to be one of the first to join what seemed like a fabled war?

"That's what I've been telling him," Clout sighed. "He just wants to make sure there aren't any here."

"Oh," Astrid straightened her back, feeling relieved. "Well, no, there aren't any dragons here. This island is very safe."

The man snarled a bit and adjusted his cape: black and scaly, nothing that Astrid had ever seen. She'd remembered the stories of what dragons supposedly looked at and almost gasped. Could he be wearing _dragon_ scales? She dared not ask. "So it seems," the man harrumphed. "We should talk boats, Clout."

Astrid had never heard someone call the chief without his title but if there was someone scary enough to get away with it, it was this guy. The chief obliged with his own grunt and stood from her table, heading for the door. "When Gout returns, we'll meet again," he told them, and the two men walked out, the door closing heavily and ominously behind them.

She waited a good twenty seconds after the door closed before she ripped into it. "Gout!?" She growled. "You can't be serious!"

Her grandmother cradled her head in her hand, looking exhausted. "This winter will likely be brutal, dear. And we love you, you know we do, but we can't wait for someone like Bugeyes or Isak to be ready to marry. Gout is ready and he has resources and status and _food."_

"You'll starve without him," her grandfather croaked. "We all will."

"I fish!" she snarled. "I'm a fisherman! I can _get us food!"_

But her grandparents still looked guilty. "The chief talked to us about that. He's made the exception since your parents died to take over your father's job, but now that you're a young woman, he said he can't allow you to do a man's job anymore," her grandmother explained.

This was ridiculous. "So I don't fish for the whole village….I can just…I can just fish for us! I'll get up real early, no one will have to know—"

"Astrid," her grandfather said quietly. "There's more to it than that. There's carpentry that needs to be done, things that needs to be sewn. You can't do everything alone."

She felt tears prick at the corner of her eyes. "I'm not alone, I have you two. Why are you talking like this?"

"The winter is likely to be brutal," her grandfather repeated and she saw the sadness in the corners of his eyes and the downward tilt of his lips. Her heart sank.

"You won't die," she whispered angrily. "Both of you will be fine. The sickness can't be any worse than it was last year, okay, you'll be fine."

Her grandfather sighed while her grandmother took a more visibly frustrated approach. She balled her hand in a fist and banged it on the table a bit. "Astrid! That is not a guarantee. You _know_ this. I hope that me and your grandfather will be fine but if we aren't you're s _crewed._ You'll have nothing."

She thought of the woods, of the little isolated house covered in bug carvings. "Gnat didn't have anything and she gets along just fine—"

Anger flashed in her grandmother's eyes. "Do _not_ talk about that woman in this house."

"Why?" she demanded. "What the hell did she do? No one has ever said anything! _Gnat_ never says anything! Did you bully her into silence?"

Another fist banged on the table, this time her grandfather's. "Enough! I will pretend that I didn't hear what you just _inferred."_ Because for whatever reason, it was taboo to talk about Gnat, let alone actually talk to her. "What's done is done, Astrid," he said, voice dropping considerably. "This will save your life."

Beside him, her grandmother snorted. "Just be thankful you're pretty. The chief wouldn't have made such an offer had you been…plainer, like your mother."

Rage surged through Astrid once more, and she fought to keep it from bubbling over. Even her grandfather groaned, knowing his wife's mistakes. "I wish I was plainer. Then maybe I wouldn't have to do your bidding!"

"Astrid!"

"Oh, come on!" She tossed her hands in the air. "You just told me my only worth is my looks! How am I supposed to take that? With grace? I can't fish because a pretty face like mine isn't worth all the sunburn and callouses, right? I can't fight because if I got hurt how would I bear all the chief's children? No one batted an eye when scrawny, chicken-boned me started to work on the docks: because I was plain. And now that I'm not?" She huffed, cutting herself off, and glared off at the wall with an intense desire to punch her fist clear through. "You saved my life, that's what you think?" she whispered. "Marrying Gout isn't a _life."_

"Astrid-"

"No, I've had enough," she grumbled, picking up her heavy dress and heading to her room. "I'll talk to you tomorrow."

She barred herself up in her room, intent on not leaving until she'd sneak out to the docks early in the morning. Her grandparents knocked twice, leaving food by her door.

She went to bed hungry, just to spite the chief.

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"Astrid! Honestly, lighten up with the sails, would you?"

Along with Scab, Isak and his younger kid sister had decided that they wanted to get away from the village as well. But unlike Scab, Isak and Camilla weren't quite aware of the mood that Astrid was in. She hadn't been kind in their sailing. The winds were rough and she was being rough right back, and the three of them down below were getting tired. Isak had long stopped putting the net back in the water once he deemed they had enough fish for the day and was concentrating on not getting sick.

But Astrid didn't want to lighten up. She wanted to sail tight corners and rough waters around the island until her arms fell off. Then maybe, she'd be too ugly to marry Gout. "Stop being a baby!" she shouted over the winds. "You said you were done fishing!"

"I'd fish more if you'd cool it!" Isak screamed. "You're being insane! How am I supposed to do anything with you swerving left and right?"

"Oh, leave her alone!" Scab shouted back. "She's marrying _Gout!_ Let her sail until she bleeds."

Apparently, the siblings were unaware of the news. Probably the only ones at this point. "You're marrying _Gout!?"_

Camilla frowned. "I don't like him."

Astrid tugged hard on the ropes of the sail. "Yeah, neither do I." She flexed her hands a few times and noticed the ropes had burned her hands raw—bloodied blisters were already starting to form. Maybe this was enough for the day. "You guys want to head in?"

All three gave a resounding, "yes" and Astrid laughed. She positioned the sails one last time so they could round the island and sail straight to the main dock of Fogg when she saw something she hadn't seen in over five years.

"Is that….a distress signal?" Scab shouted and the other three nodded in agreement, leaning over the side of the boat to get a better look.

Out of the three boats, the one up front, Gout's boat, was the one in trouble. Astrid kept looking for signs of sinking, but she didn't see any. The men on their boat were waving their hands wildly, getting the attention of the people on the dock. She saw Finn run up the hill and she could hear the screaming, even when she pulled back to let the other ships in first.

"It's Gout! It's Gout! Someone get the chief!"

Camilla and Scab both gasped and the wind in Astrid's ears suddenly became deafening. Gout? What had happened to Gout?"

Isak quietly got her attention and told her to direct the boat to some rickety dock to the west that was too small for big ships like Gout's, but okay for Astrid's. She nodded and adjusted the sails one last time, a sharp tug that made every muscle in her arms ache. Little Camilla jumped off the boat as soon as the dock was close enough, and Scab wasn't far behind. Isak stayed and helped to tie everything down, but his movements and work were sloppy as he kept looking back at the sizeable crowd forming on the hill and down at the dock below.

"You don't think…?" His voice was worried.

Astrid climbed the top of her mast and held on with one arm, using her weight to push out and survey the sea like a sail. It was hard to see but she could see about four men carrying a fifth men off the boat toward their chief who was parting the crowd as he stomped down to the boats.

"There's a body," Astrid called down to Isak. "I don't know who it is or if he's…." She couldn't bring herself to say it.

"They were shouting Gout's name. Dark hair?"

She squinted, trying to tell. "I don't know."

"Okay, well what about—"

Astrid huffed and looked down at the deck. "I don't know," she repeated. "I can't see very well from here. Just go and check it out yourself. I can do the rest here. I'll be up after—"

Isak didn't hear the rest as he was already flying out of the boat, nearly falling into the water as he tried to leap into the wobbly dock. Far up ahead, Camilla and Scab had joined the crowd. Astrid climbed the rest of the mast and tried to see what was happening: the four men had passed the other one along to the chief, who was now carrying him up the hill: whoever he held was deathly ill or injured at best judging by the women's wailing that filled the air.

"Shit," Astrid swore softly her eyes gazing west. If she got off and headed into the woods there, she'd do a little climbing, but she could get to Gnat's house faster that way, plus she'd avoid town. Gnat might have salve or herbs that could help if the man—if _Gout—_ was still alive.

On one hand, if she returned to the village with herbs and salve, they'd question where she got it. Astrid didn't know much about…well, much about anything according to the village. She knew fish and she knew weapons, both things she wasn't supposed to know anything about. They'd figure out she got them from Gnat sooner than later, and that wouldn't help anyone.

On the other hand though, if Gout died….if he was already _dead…_ her marriage would be cancelled. But Astrid feared what that would mean for her and the village. Astrid feared what that would do to the chief.

In the end, Astrid headed straight for the village, but she took her time. She climbed the hill and hid behind the outer homes of the village, trying to pick up on something without being seen. The whole town square was a riot: women were crying, men were yelling, but Gout nor the chief were anywhere to be found. Noise was everywhere, but she couldn't hear any conversation, so Astrid took a chance and ran straight for the forge.

"Bugeyes!" she hissed when she slipped in unnoticed. "Bugeyes! Bug-mmph!"

A hand covered her mouth and pulled her aside, pushing her back against one of the walls. Astrid listened as a few men ran by before Bugeyes pulled his hand away with a weary sigh.

"What's going on?" Astrid asked. "I saw the fleet come in, they sent a distress signal. They carried someone off."

"Yeah."

"Was it Gout?"

"Yeah."

 _"_ _Shit."_

 _"_ _Yeah."_

She paused and took a shuddering breath. As they stood in silence she noticed there was a shaking in Bugeyes' breath as well. He was scared. They both were. "Is he alive?" she asked.

His eyes glanced behind her as his mouth quirked to the side. He was calculating; it was the same look he wore when he was working. "Technically," he finally decided. "But I don't think he'll last more than a couple of hours. He was kinda good as dead when he got there."

A hand flew to Astrid's mouth as a wave of nausea overwhelmed her. Bugeyes stared at her a moment before he reached into his pocket and pulled out a slightly dirty piece of cloth.

"It's scented," he told her when she noticed her apprehension. "I know it's not very clean, but the smell will settle your stomach so you won't throw up. Press it to your face."

She did as he asked and instantly, she felt better. It smelled like pine. Now she understood why he carried this around all the time. "Thanks," she mumbled, handing it back to him. He shook his head and pushed it back into her hands.

"Keep it," he mumbled. "I feel like you'll need it more than I do." He looked her up and down and noticed her ratty pants and oversized tunic. "You've been on the boat all day?"

"I went fishing as an engagement present to myself," she snorted, but the sarcastic amusement melted away quickly. "But now…"

"I know," he said quickly. They both felt tense. An air of uncertainty had fallen over the village: what's Fogg Island without an heir? Bugeyes looked back out the front entrance of the forge, his frown more prominent. "Maybe you should get out of here. Blow off some steam."

She knew what he implied but then it hit her: her axe. Scab never brought it home, nor did she bring on the boat that morning. "I don't have my—"

Bugeyes eyes flickered to the corner where he saw her axe hastily hidden behind other weaponry.

"She dropped it off last night," he said quietly. "I cleaned it again—you really got it all muddied."

"You didn't have to do that."

He hummed. "It's okay. Just go."

"Bugeyes," she whispered harshly when he gently tugged on her elbow, trying to get her to escape. "Bugeyes, my grandparents and the chief made a contract," she swallowed thickly. "They signed it and everything."

His eyes went round as the moon. "Did you read it? What were the terms?"

"No," she spat. "Why would they let me read it?" She sighed, and gripped his sleeves with desperation. "I don't know. I don't know but _Bugeyes_ …..if I was promised to the _family_ and not just _Gout…._ and if Gout _dies…"_

He pulled her into a hug. They were the same height and she fit comfortably against him. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry." She swore she heard a sniffle before he pulled away and reached down to grab her axe. "Go. I'll cover for you. Just leave. Come back after sunset. Leave the axe here before you go home."

She nodded, gripping her axe tightly, and ran out of the forge at full speed.

Astrid didn't care if anyone saw her. It was unlikely that they did; everyone seemed too preoccupied with the dying heir and for good reason. Gout was not only the chief's only son, but his only child. Without him, there was no one to take over.

 _Yet,_ Astrid thought. The nausea crept over her again and she took the cloth that Bugeyes had given her and pressed it to her face.

She ran all the way to her usual spot, past the cove and Gnat's house and all the way to the meadow. The day's light was flickering away, casting the island in a golden light: it was uncharacteristically beautiful, which was a bad sign. Village fables always told stories of natural phenomenon occurring as a means to carry those of importance to Valhalla.

For now, though, Astrid could pretend that Gout was still hanging on by a thread.

In all the chaos, Astrid had forgotten how parched she'd become. There was a fresh spring in the meadow so she set her axe aside behind a nearby tree before she went over and used her hands to bring the water to her lips. A few sips of water and then she thought, fuck it, and dunked her entire head in.

She held her breath for 15 seconds, considered drowning herself, and then pulled herself out with a gasp.

Wiping her face with Bugeyes' cloth, Astrid fell back into the grass by the water with a heavy pant. Water trickled from her hair and brow as she stared up at the sky, the color fading from a light blue to a purplish tint. It looked like a bruise and the thought had her absentmindedly kneading at her sore and blistered hands as best she could. She really overdid it on the sails today. With a sigh, she closed her eyes and propped herself up. Blindly, she crawled back on her elbows and leaned back against a dark rock near the water's edge. Her head thudded against the rock a she tucked the rag back in her pockets: then she noticed the texture was strange and the rock _moved._

The rock _breathed._

With a small shout Astrid whirled around, scrambling to get back on her hands and knees to see just sort of trouble she'd gotten herself into.

She'd never seen anything like it.

The creature was dark, almost black, but not quite: in the dying light of the day, Astrid could tell that whatever this…thing was, it was more dark blue than black. The coloring was uneven and some of the scales were brighter and almost sparkled like stars in the oncoming twilight as the animal slept.

As she took in its shape, Astrid recognized it from someplace, but it was hard to pinpoint where. The more she thought about it she realized she hadn't seen it in the village, but rather in Gnat's home: she had whittled something that looked _just_ like this. It sat on the highest shelf in her hut. She'd asked her what it was one day, and she had said a dragon.

A _dragon._

Astrid had almost just napped on a living, breathing, _dragon._

Dragons weren't safe. Astrid had heard the horror stories from the men who visited other islands. Dragons destroyed homes, crops, stole sheep and ate people. They were man's worst nightmare. But…

Astrid had almost just napped on a living breathing dragon, and it hadn't even woken up. Besides, if Gnat could get close enough to study it and whittle something of its liking ….it couldn't have been that unsafe.

She'd have to ask her. Right now. If she could get away alive.

As quietly as she could Astrid attempted to tiptoe past the sleeping dragon. But with every movement, the dragons' nostrils flared until it was snorting and then it opened its eyes slowly, like a baby that had just been woken from its nap.

The biggest pair of blue eyes stared straight at her with a gaze so intense, Astrid couldn't move.

So she tried talking. "Hi…" she whispered. The dragon's eyes, cat-like and surprisingly friendly, widened a little more as it woke up; the nostrils flared like it smelled dinner. She did _not_ want to be dinner. "I'm not going to hurt you…"

It was true. Her axe was several feet away. She couldn't even if she tried.

The dragon continued to sniff around her until its cold nose bumped against Astrid's cheek, shirt, and waist. Waiting on baited breath, Astrid didn't move or speak as the dragon sniffed her all over until it eventually wedged its nose underneath her tunic to touch her bare skin. She yelped and the dragon pulled back, cocking its head to the side curiously.

"What?" she asked shakily. The dragon wiggled in place, tapping its front legs on the dirt a few times as it straightened it place. Its eyes darted back and forth between Astrid's face and her waist. Astrid tried to think of why it kept _sniffing_ her until she realized:

She smelled like fish.

The dragon wanted her to give it fish.

"I don't have any fish, if that's what you're after," she said slowly, feeling only a little silly that she was talking out loud to a dragon like it could answer her. "Is that what you eat? Fish?"

The dragon licked its mouth in answer, and Astrid actually laughed.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I don't have any fish." She paused, thinking. "Does Gnat give you fish?"

It almost seemed like the dragon recognized Gnat's name. It perked up, looking excited, before it started bounding up and down across the meadow, jumping up on tree branches and scratching at tree bark. When it sat on one particularly soft branch it snapped and the dragon started to fall, saved by the swoop of its own wings.

"Whoa, whoa!" Astrid shouted, feeling a little frightened as she saw the full length of its wingspan. It was _huge._ "Gnat's not here so calm down." Another thought struck her. "Gnat?" she repeated, and again, the dragon got excited, which was weird. Even if the dragon knew Gnat, how would it know her name? Gnat couldn't speak.

…Could she?

With a groan, Astrid slumped to the ground and curled into a ball. This day was quickly becoming one of the most overwhelming ones she'd ever had; definitely on par with the day her parents died, maybe worse when she got back to the village and find out that Gout had actually died.

She groaned again and listed her head only to nearly jump out of her skin when she found the dragon's face was right in front of her.

This close, she could really see every color of blue in its eyes; the blue of the sky, the blue of the water, and even the greenish murky color that sloshed around in white foam near shallow parts of the beaches. Its eyes were so bright, a stark contrast to the deep blue of its scales.

"Pretty…" she murmured, lifting her hand to touch its nose. The nostrils flared wildly again and Astrid laughed. "I know, they smell like fish. I don't mean to tease you. I don't have any, honest."

The dragon seemed to accept that. Its eyes closed and it leaned its snout into Astrid's palm. She rubbed her hand back and forth before the dragon's eyes snapped open again and looked at her hand, blistered in every crease of her fingers.

"I know, my fingers aren't very—Eugh, gross!" she yelped when the dragon suddenly licked her hand. She shook it once, twice, and listened with disgust as a wad of dragon _spit_ fell into the grass. "That wasn't nice," she grumbled and she _swore_ that dragon laughed.

She wondered how much it understood of her. She wondered smart they really were.

Astrid didn't have the chance to dwell on it.

The dragons' ears perked up before Astrid could even hear it; a rustling and mumbling from beyond the meadow clearing. The dragon growled quietly, round shark like teeth bore in a soft snarl and came to stand next to Astrid, wrapping its long tail around her in a semi-protective circle. Its eyes were slits.

It took a moment, but she eventually recognized the voice. It wasn't Gnat.

The dragon didn't stand a chance.

"You have to go," Astrid whispered, pushing on the side of the animal's cheek. Immediately, the snarl went away and pupils enlarged before looking at Astrid and giving a soft purr of confusion. "Please, go. If he catches you he'll try to kill you. Come back when he's gone, okay?" she gave the dragon a few more pats as the rustling got louder. "Go!" she whispered. "I'll be fine, just go!"

Astrid swore she heard a whine from the dragon before it listened to her, jumping and hopping a bit before it spread its wings and dived behind the trees beyond the meadow.

"Astrid."

She tore her eyes away from the forest's horizon and turned back around to see Chief Clout standing a few meters away. In a flurry, she staggered to her feet, feeling….inadequate. Reeking of fish and covered in grime, wearing men's clothing no less, was no way to stand in front of a man like Clout.

"Chief." Astrid cleared her throat, trying to stand as straight and lady-like as ever.

"I've been looking for you," he said lowly. It was hard to gage his mood. "We all have."

"We?"

He took a few steps closer, looking around the meadow. It was barely light out anymore. "The village," he elaborated. "Some said they see you run off here sometimes, so I thought I'd check. It was quite the hike."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to inconvenience you." She grasped the edges if her tunic with two hands in a nervous gesture. "I'll come home straight away, sir."

"No," he said suddenly and with a little bite. It spooked her a bit. "This is fine. I need to talk to you alone."

"Oh."

Clout took a deep breath. "My son, Gout," he stopped, looking off to the side and clenching his fist in anger. "He fell ill on his journey and did not recover. He's passed."

That sinking feeling she had been dreading hit her full force and it took everything Astrid had to lock her knees and keep herself from collapsing in fear in front of him. "I'm….that's terrible. I'm so sorry." And she meant it.

The chief was still hard to read. The creeping dark of night wasn't helping either.

"I have no heir," he said slowly. "No brothers, no sisters, no other children. I don't even have my wife anymore. Your marriage to my son was supposed to put this village at ease and now his death has made it more chaotic than ever. Do you understand?"

"Yes, sir," How her voice remained calm, she did not know.

"The village can't go on like this." He paused, looking at her. She could barely see the whites of his eyes in the moonlight. "It's time that I remarry, especially now that another heir is needed. And luckily, your grandparents' contract promised you to my family, not just Gout. Less complicated for everyone."

It was just as she feared.

"Sir," she said, the word shaky on her tongue. "I'm not sure if I'm the best option for a wife—"

Suddenly, he surged forward and grabbed her by both of her wrists. She barely registered that she was lifted off the ground until he had her pinned against the closest tree trunk a ways away, both her arms held roughly by her sides.

"I'm not asking you," he growled. "I'm _telling_ you."

She failed to swallow her whimper.

"Beautiful…" he mumbled, one of his pudgy hands snaking down her neck, over her breast and down to her hip. "I thought you and Gout would have the most beautiful children. I picked you for that reason. I could have had you for myself, but I didn't want to be selfish. But now I can. Our children will be beautiful, too, just like you."

Or ugly, like him. She dared not think about it.

Because it wasn't going to happen.

Her fear spiked with her heart rate as his grip loosened and he used his weight to keep her pressed to the tree trunk; the bark dug into her back and she whimpered again as his hands found the waistband of her pants.

"What are you doing?" she cried, trying to slap him away. He only pinned her arms back to the tree. "You can't do that!"

"Relax," he grunted, struggling to keep her against the tree. "We'll be married by the end of the week." The horror was not lost on her and she cried out, only to have one of his hands covering her mouth. The other gave up on her pants for now and reached for his belt. "A few days won't make a difference. No one will know. And the sooner the heir, the better …"

No.

 _No._

This was not happening.

She flailed, her arms reaching behind the skinny tree trunk when she felt it:

The handle to her axe.

Her axe was behind this tree. She had left her axe behind _this very tree_ —and the chief had no idea.

As his belt came off, she knew it would only be moments before he'd try to strip her bare before him. With one hand she gripped the handle of her axe as best she could and thanked every god for all the days she spent throwing it one handed at the trees in the forest. She thanked every god for all the days she spent lugging nets of fish up the hill day after day. She thanks every god for all the sails she pulled, all the lumber she'd carried, all the climbing she'd ever done because it made her _strong._

Strong enough to stop him.

With his eyes down and focused on trying to make her submit, Astrid's every muscle screamed as she lifted her axe with one arm and used it to thump him right on top of the head. Or, at least that was the plan: use the axe to hit him on the head and he'd fall unconscious. Then she'd escape and….figure it later. But it was supposed to buy her time.

But she and her axe were a little short on the target; instead the blade cut Clout right at the neck.

He screamed and fumbled back, grasping at his neck that was dripping a steady stream of blood. Astrid used the opportunity to grab her axe with both hands, gripping it tight for defense.

"You _bitch!"_ he screeched. Astrid did not expect such speed from him and he knocked her to the ground, her head narrowly missing a rock. Her axe lay feet away from her as Clout climbed on top of her and slapped her across the face as hard as she could. She screamed, curling up in pain as he pressed his weight into her. "Now," he growled, reaching for her pants again. "Be a good girl and just-!"

A loud, piercing screech filled the dark forest sky, unlike anything either of them had ever heard.

And when Clout looked up, Astrid saw the terror of the unknown flash across his moonlit features before she picked up her axe with both hands and slashed it across his neck, this time with purpose.

The wound widened and blood that was once dripping like a creek began gushing like a geyser.

In his further shock Astrid managed to scramble from out under him; she took her foot and shoved him in the face as hard as she could. She could never kick him back, he was too large, but she managed to kick his head straight into the rock she had narrowly missed earlier.

When his temple struck the rock, his mouth went slack and his eyes went wide as blood continued to gush from his neck and then…

Silence.

Astrid has no idea how long she stood there in shock before she thought to do something. "No, no, no," she mumbled to herself as she got on her knees. Her hands and shirt became covered in blood as she attempted to shake him awake, to find a pulse, to find any reason that meant he'd wake up because otherwise…

She just killed a man.

She just killed the _chief._

All the nausea from the day was nothing compared to the bile that rose in her throat in that moment. With tears in her eyes she leaned over and threw up the next to nothing that was in her stomach before she began sobbing uncontrollably in a heap on the ground.

"No, no, no," she wailed, fisting the meadow's grass in her hands. She was really wishing she had drowned herself in the water when she first thought about it. Her hair became matted in blood as she pulled at her bangs and continued to scream. "No! No! No!"

There was a soft mewl beside her before she felt a familiar snout push into her cheek.

Astrid managed to stop screaming and sobbing long enough to look up to see that her dragon friend had returned. In the moonlight her friend looked as dark as the sky, but the uneven colored blue scales glowed like actual stars. It was like looking at a constellation.

The dragon's eyes shone the same soft blue as it continued to purr and nudge her. Eventually, when it got fed up with Astrid not moving, it mouthed the back of her collar and pulled her across the meadow, as far away from Clout that she could get without having to be picked up.

"What have I done?" Astrid sobbed, sitting up and resting her elbows on her knees; she cradled one cheek in a dirty palm. The dragon came up and wedged its head in her lap as she continued to shake. "What am I going to do?" she sniffed. "I can't…I can't even stay here I don't…" Her hands absentmindedly scratched the top of the dragon's head before she leaned down and rested her forehead upon it, her whole body shaking in shock and grief.

The dragon gave her a few more mewls and whines before it wiggled out of her hold and went back to mouthing her shirt collar again, trying to drag her. In the dark of it all she couldn't see where they were going, but there was only one place that dragon _would_ take her.

Gnat's.

Adrenaline still pumping through her veins, Astrid managed to get to her feet. She ran as fast as she could, her sobs still echoing off the trees and her feet stumbling over rocks. The dragon led the way, the iridescent glow of its scales something to follow and before Astrid knew it her bloodied fists were pounding desperately on the wooded cottage door.

"Gnat!" she begged. "Gnat please, open up! Gnat-!"

The door wrenched open and Gnat stood there wide-eyed with her shoes in her hand. She looked half ready to go out, frazzled and disheveled. Astrid's appearance couldn't have put her nerves at ease. She stood, stunned, and waited for an explanation from Astrid. Tears still in her eyes, she blurted out a half truth:

"The chief is dead."

Gnat stared back and forth between her and the dragon that sat by her side and then did something Astrid never expected.

She spoke.

"Come in," Gnat whispered, widening the door so that both she and the dragon could come inside. Astrid stood shivering in the middle of the hut as the dragon came to nuzzle against Gnat's waist: it seemed her hunches were correct. The dragon knew Gnat, and Gnat knew the dragon. She'd even let it inside.

"I'm s-sorry," Astrid wept. She'd never cried this hard in her life. "I didn't know where else to go."

Gnat's brow scrunched as he hands hovered over Astrid, not knowing where to start. Her hands were rough on her forehead as she gently brushed her grimy bangs aside. "What happened?"

If possible, Astrid started crying harder; she barely heard Gnat's gentle hushes in attempts to soothe her, or registered her hands on her arms, rubbing gently back and forth "I'm sorry!" Astrid wailed. "I didn't mean to!"

Finally, she felt Gnat's hands on the bottom of her tunic and Astrid yelped, slapping her hand away. "Hey, it's okay, it's just me. I was just going to help you clean up. Freckles, get her some new clothes."

The dragon gurgled in response and sauntered over to the corner where Gnat kept her things. It dragged out a dress with its mouth and in the low candlelit light of her home she noticed—the dragon's teeth, once round and pearly white, were gone. A gummy mouth remained.

"Take them off, I'll clean them," Gnat said gently and Astrid didn't need to be told twice. She ripped her shirt and pants off as quickly as she could and accepted Gnat's dress, slipping it on: it was old, one she'd never seen before—it looked like something that Scab and her mother might have sewn. "Astrid."

She looked up. "I didn't know you could talk."

Gnat gave a wiry smile. "Yeah, well. Someone has to talk to Freckles. Otherwise she'd get bored."

Astrid looked down at the dragon that was nervously pacing between the two women. "Freckles? That's her name?" A nod. Made sense considering her scales. "So that's a dragon?" Astrid sniffed, wiping her eyes with a clean sleeve. "They don't look like the drawings." Her eyes traveled to one of the shelves with the wooden carving that she had previously thought was something else. "She looks more like a salamander."

"She's just as harmless," Gnat said softly, rubbing Freckles' head. "My oversized salamander." Her fond smile made way for a frown. "I heard her scream, that's why I was on my way out, to look for her but…" she looked down at the pile of soiled garments and back up at Astrid. "What happened? The chief died? Was there a fight?"

"No," Astrid hiccupped, choking back a sob. There was a story, a whole long-winded story that was a precursor to what just happened but Astrid didn't have time. So she went right out and said it. "The chief died because I killed him."

Gnat's eyes almost fell out of her head. She said nothing in response.

So she kept going. "I was supposed to marry his son, but then Gout died and then the chief was going to marry _me…_ he came to find me to tell me, I was in the woods, and then he tried to—he didn't _care_ , he said we'd be married soon enough and that he needed another son and so he tried to….he tried to…" Her hand flew to her mouth to stifle her cries. She couldn't say it.

But she didn't have to; Gnat knew. Her face expression contorted from shock to anger—Astrid had never seen Gnat so close to growling with rage.

"That bastard," she spat out. Astrid watched as her eyes darted back and forth at the floor, thinking, calculating. She always did this when she was trying to figure out better ways for Astrid to fight or throw. And now she waited with anticipation to actually hear her plans aloud.

But first she felt the need to point out, "She saved my life," Astrid whispered, gesturing to the dragon. Freckles came over and nuzzled her hand. "Her cry distracted the chief. I only meant to knock him out but he hit his head on a rock and then now he's…I just wanted to get him off me-"

"But you were alone?" Gnat interrupted, her tone clipped.

"Yeah." She sniffed again. "I don't know how much longer we can both be gone without someone coming to look for us. No one really goes this far up except me, they might not think to come up here but they will, eventually."

Gnat wrinkled her nose as she tapped her chin with her index finger. "You probably have a couple of hours before they find him." She looked down at Astrid's hands and frowned. "You left your axe where? In the woods where you practice? That's where he is?"

"I—"

"I'll go get it," she said, adjusting her coat and hastily putting on her shoes. "While I'm here, I want you to pack all my old clothes from that basket—" She pointed to the one that Freckles had retrieved from. "—and then I want you to find my star charts and a few pieces of parchment from that table over there, and put it in that knapsack. There's already some tools in there, don't take them out. You'll need them." She pointed to a bag hanging on the wall. "Pack a few of the vegetables on the table, but not too many. They won't last. If you see any herbs and you know what they do, take those too. Hell, take the bow and arrow, you'll need those. Then take whatever else you can carry that looks useful. Once you're done, head straight to the docks for your boat. Stay hidden, and do not cut through the village. I'll meet you there."

It was a lot to process for Astrid's adrenaline-racing one-tracked mind. Her heart was still pounding in her ears, the back of her neck was slick with sweat and she was still kind of crying. But following instructions as quickly as she could—Astrid could handle that for now. She repeated what Gnat had instructed, who in turn gave her a thumbs up before she headed for the door.

"Freckles, come with me. I need your help."

For some reason, Astrid became terrified with the idea of being alone. "But—"

Gnat ran back over and cupped Astrid's face with both hands. "I'll be fine. Just pack and get to the docks as fast as you can. Freckles and I will be along soon."

"But—!"

"I'll be along soon. Hurry." She pressed a kiss to Astrid's forehead, and left.

As soon as the door closed, Astrid flew on what adrenaline she had left. She stuffed the clothes in the already partially full bag, along with the star charts, parchment, and some ink and a quill, just in case. As for the food, she took whatever looked most unripe and stuffed it into the bag, along with herbs. With the bag slung over her shoulder, and the bow and arrows slung over the other, she started to head out when she noticed her blood-ridden shirt and pants lay hastily crumpled on the ground by Gnat's table. Astrid wanted nothing more than to toss them in a fire but….if she was going to be on a boat, she might need them.

Disgusted, she grabbed them and slung them over her shoulder.

The adrenaline waned only slightly when she made it to her boat by the dock. Astrid thanked every god in the universe that she had chosen today of all days to tie her boat up on the old dock—it was the only one there, and no one was bound to see her, even if someone were to be by the main docks for whatever reason. Now all she had to do was dump her stuff on the boat and wait for Freckles and Gnat to come along.

It didn't take long for them to show up. Gnat walked with purpose, but she did not run, as she headed towards Astrid's boat, her axe in hand. In the glimmering moonlight, Astrid noticed that it had been cleaned of the chief's blood. She vaguely wondered how she had the time to do that.

"What did you do?" Astrid asked she swung one leg out of the boat to rest on the dock, her hand outstretched to help her in. Freckles wiggled her tail left and right before she pounced and jumped into the boat. It rocked wildly and Astrid forced herself to fall back into the boat, her bum breaking her fall.

She got no answer. Gnat shook the axe a few times and waited for Astrid to open her hands so she could catch it. It seemed Gnat clearly had no intent to come on the boat, which baffled her. Why would she have Astrid take all her things? "Aren't you coming?"

She shook her head and looked past her at Freckles, who was rocking back and forth on the boat. There was a faint smile on her lips. "No, I'm going to stay here."

"You can't!" Astrid blurted. "With the chief that far out in the woods, they'll think that you-!"

"I'll handle it," she said softly. "I'll be fine. You need to go though."

Astrid frowned and her crying, which had only just stopped, began to pick up again as fear twisted and knotted her insides. "No, you can't. If you stay here you'll _die."_

"I'll be fine. I know what I'm doing." Her eyes widened a fracture before she reached behind her neck and untied a necklace she had hidden under her dress. "Take this. Use your fishing skills to barter for things, but if you get in a bind, sell this." She held her pendant to the moonlight to reveal a dark, green gem set in gold. "It's not much, but it's something. I wish I had more to give you."

Astrid stared at the necklace, stunned and overwhelmed, and froze. With a somewhat frustrated sigh, Gnat reached over and tied it around Astrid's neck, tucking it under her clothes and out of sight.

"Go north," she instructed. "It's cold, but it's your best shot. Friendlier Vikings up north. Eat the perishables until you find an island, then switch to fish. Always look for fresh water first. If you can't find any, just leave, it's not worth staying, not even to rest. Try to avoid ones with villages, but if you must, stay hidden from their town. Don't worry about starting fires, Freckles will help with that—but you might need to remind her not to start a fire on the boat."

That snapped Astrid out of her trance. She whirled back around and stared at the dragon that was pacing back and forth on the boat, looking upset. "You want me to take Freckles?"

"It won't be safe here for her anymore," Gnat admitted. "I've managed to keep her hidden for years, but I don't think I'll be able to do that anymore. When the village finds Clout, they'll find her. She's safer with you, and you're safer with her. As long as she doesn't start a fire on the boat, _are we clear young lady?"_

The latter part of the sentence was clearly meant for Freckles. The dragon made a noise akin to a chuckle before she pounced out of the boat and walked over to Gant, nuzzling her at the hip. "Are you going to take care of Astrid?"

Astrid couldn't help a small smile when the dragon nodded, tongue lolling out of a gummy, toothless mouth.

"That's my good girl," Gnat whispered, leaning down to give the dragon a kiss on the snout. "Now go get on the boat and wait, she'll be there soon. And you," her voice dropped significantly as she came to cup Astrid's face with both her hands. Her calloused thumbs smoothed against her cheeks. "I don't know much about her," Gnat admitted, looking back at the boat towards Freckles. "She doesn't fly much. She won't hurt you, but I can't promise she'll stay on the boat for long. I don't know. But for now, let her help you." she brushed Astrid's bangs out of her face. "Be her friend. She already likes you. She wouldn't have saved you if she didn't."

Her eyes fluttered shut and she tried to memorize the touch of her hand and the sound of her voice. "Please come with me," she begged softly. "Please."

"I'll be okay," she promised. "But I have to stay here. You can't. Do you understand?"

She nodded mutely, her face contorted in grief before her head fell forward to rest against Gnat's chest. "I can never come back. I'll never see you again."

Gnat wrapped her arms around her in a hug and swayed them back and forth to the tune of the lapping waves. "I know. It'll be hard, but there's a home for you somewhere. Don't forget this."

Astrid thought of Gnat's secluded home in the woods and the way she's had to live for the past ten years: ten years of silence, ten years of getting food and clothes and everything by herself with only Astrid to help. It was the new home that Gnat had to make for herself, alone when she was just fifteen, after their village turned their back on her. What kind of home was that?

"I'm sorry," Astrid whispered. Sorry for the way the village treated Gnat, sorry for the way she had to live, sorry for how she turned her life upside down in moments because she had nowhere else to turn. Astrid was sorry for a lot of things.

"You're forgiven," Gnat whispered back. "You were always forgiven."

She wondered what silenced her for so long; her voice was the sweetest sound Astrid had ever heard.

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end part one

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 _ **AN** : okay so this fic is going to be…..an ordeal lmfao. It's based off those drabbles I wrote on my Holocene one shot series, but you don't have to read that to understand this, obviously. I've changed a lot of stuff, but hopefully a lot of what you liked will stay. If you don't like Astrid-centric fics, you probably won't like this one I'm sorry. But I promise that Hiccup and Astrid will eventually meet._

 _Since this fic is kind of a great big adventure AU fic, it might get confusing. If you have a question about the setting, the plot or any detail, I'll do my best to answer it. If you just like it so far though, Please please pleeeeeease tell me what you think I worked very hard on this it is 13k of….hard work. Hah._

 _PS: Freckles is probably exactly the kind of dragon you think she is. Hehe._

 _PSS: Clout in recent times means "to strike a blow" but it also used to mean a piece of cloth or a patch. It also rhymes with Gout lmfao which we all know sucks._


	2. Chapter 2

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eulogy for home

part two / / we woke up and fell into the ocean

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After Astrid left Fogg Island, she couldn't sleep for two days.

All things considered, including the actual _murder_ that took place, it should have been super easy. The waves that carried her and Freckles out to sea were calm steady—the kind that reminded Astrid of a mother rocking her baby to sleep. It was peaceful, her favorite kind of weather. Combine that with the adrenaline that fizzed away like foamy waves and left her _exhausted,_ sleep should have come easy. Good sleep, well, probably not, but at _least_ the terrible kind where you wake up every forty-five minutes out of sheer panic or anxiety should have been feasible.

But Astrid was too afraid to close her eyes.

By the third morning, the wind had become stale; her boat was nearly sitting stagnant in the water, only being carried by the ocean's soft current. It was too difficult to try and maneuver the sails just to try to go in a direction where she had no real endpoint. There was still a sizeable amount of drinking water left on the boat from when she, Isak, and the others had gone fishing so while getting clean water was _definitely_ a priority, Astrid was more than content to just….lay down on the boat for a few hours.

Freckles, however, was not.

"Stop pacing," Astrid mumbled, her voice almost lost in the sound of the waves hitting against her boat. Freckles acknowledged her briefly before she went back to walking up and down the length of her boat; her tail almost whacked Astrid in the face for the fifth time that day. The dragon had managed to sit down and rest a few times, but for the most part she hadn't stopped moving. It seemed both of them were too anxious to sleep.

Freckles let out a whine and looked down south, big blue eyes unfocused on the smooth horizon.

"Gnat will be fine," Astrid told her because while she wasn't a dragon mind-reader, she knew one thing: Freckles was just as worried about their friend as she was. "She said she would. So she'll be fine."

The dragon let out another whine that told Astrid she didn't quite believe her.

"Look, there's nothing we can do now. We can't go back. So just…settle down."

Easier said than done.

Eventually, the sun started to set and Freckles' anxious energy begun to rub off on her. It was like all of a sudden the boat was too small, and the feeling left a raw, painful lump in her throat. She needed a distraction.

Nibbling on a carrot stick, Astrid decided she'd go through all of the things she managed to stuff into that oversized knapsack that Gnat had given her. "Let's see," she said, setting aside the arrows that she had nabbed and put it with the bow in a spot beside her. "A few vegetables, a few herbs including…." She stopped and snorted. "Tea. Perfect. Just want I need to make on a boat in the middle of the ocean. A cup of tea."

Freckles whined again when she saw Astrid scrub roughly at her eyes.

"Sorry," she apologized, still not completely sure why she was talking to the dragon. It helped, and she supposed that in the end that was all that mattered. Astrid gave her head a good shake before she dug past the clothes for the few things that had been in the bag before she had packed it: things that Gnat said could be useful.

The first was a map—not the star chart, but something a little more hastily planned, pieces of parchment stuck together with something…sticky. Maybe tree sap, she wasn't sure. The most detail was of Fogg itself, but there was other striking detail in the surrounding islands nearby.

Astrid dared a look around, but saw nothing but the blue of the ocean and the blue of the sky.

"How did she get this? Did she trade for it?" Astrid turned it sideways, trying to read one of the inscriptions before she attempted to unfold it completely. "Did she make it?" She turned to Freckles. "Well? Are you going to tell me anything?"

Freckles let out a small trill.

"It has to be her, she made it…." She mumbled, her thumb gently tracing the edges of Fogg. "We aren't on anyone else's map," she chuckled tiredly. "No one but our own."

North. Gnat told her to go north. With her thumb, Astrid traced the fluid lines representing the currents that always carried the boats north for fishing; her thumb passed their normal fishing routes and kept going until it hit a small island.

Something occurred to her. She looked up at the dragon, brow furrowed and Freckles cocked her head, almost as if to mirror her confusion. "Has Gnat ever been off the island? She's _had_ to…" The dragon made a few noises in response. "Does she have a boat? Or…." She blinked. "You."

Freckles gave her a gummy smile.

"She went with you, she…she _had_ to. Somehow. Surely." Astrid's eyes traced the so-called freckled scales down her back, their shimmer more vibrant now that the sun was dying. "Or at least you flew out and got it for her. Stole it. Some sort of dragon-pirate, maybe?"

The dragon's tongue fell out of her mouth and for the first time since she got on the boat, Astrid cracked a smile.

"It's pretty funny to think about it, isn't it?" she admitted with a dry chuckle as she folded the map up and placed it carefully back in the bag in hopes of keeping the sea salts and mist off it. "Let's see….what else," her hand dug blindly in the bag and she found another book, this time much bulkier, leather-bound traveler's journal. "God, so that's what I was lugging around. I thought she had a _hammer_ in here."

As she turned it over, face up, she noticed the stamp on the front: a gnat.

She'd never seen Gnat actually carve or draw any flies or actual gnats on her stuff. It was always bees, beetles and butterflies. Curious, Astrid made haste to flip open the pages, only to find the most comprehensive collection of drawings and lists that she had ever seen. Every page was a different drawing of a plant followed by detailed description: color, size, and use. With this, Astrid would never have to worry about whether something was edible: she could simply look it up in this book.

"This is amazing...did you see her draw this?" She asked, chuckling a little when Freckles decided that her nose needed to be almost directly underneath Astrid's armpit. "She must have spent years on this. All ten years…surely."

A sigh.

After leafing through the pages, Astrid shut the book with a snap that had Freckles startled. As she stuffed it back in the bag, her hand brushed against the familiar feel of metal: cold and smooth. Careful not to prick her finger, she reached for what she assumed would be some unsheathed knife; only to pull out one of the more ornate daggers she'd seen on Fogg.

"Bugeyes you damn liar," Astrid almost grinned as she turned the dagger over in her palm. The metalwork had intricate designs, mostly swirls and lines that while simple in design, was more ornate than anything made for weapons on Fogg. This was made special.

On the handle, a gnat.

This was made special for _her._

Astrid couldn't help her shuddering sigh. For the first time since she was on the docks, she felt tears pricking at the corner of her eyes. Mentally, she blamed it on the sea salt. "Why would she give me this?" Her voice was raspy, the words barely carved on her tongue. "Why wouldn't she want this?"

She unsheathed the blade and it caught the sunset, a rainbow of light.

What was going to happen to Gnat?

Astrid tried, she _really_ tried to figure out what Gnat had….planning. There wasn't any way that she could hide the body, not realistically. And even if she did in the end, wouldn't the village still blame her? They'd be quick to judge and she would have been executed before dawn.

Oh god.

Dawn had long passed.

Without much notice, Astrid's stomach lurched. Freckles' lifted her head just in time to see Astrid scramble to the side of the boat and vomit.

"Sorry," she said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. The dragon came over and nuzzled her, even licking said hand. "That's so gross. You are so gross. We are both so _gross."_

The churning feeling in her stomach calmed, but didn't vanish. Astrid briefly wondered if it would ever go away, of if guilt would eat her stomach inside out.

As the sun set completely, Astrid fished out the star chart, but she didn't do anything with it, not yet. It sat unrolled on the deck while the boat continued its smooth sail northward along the current that ran up the oceans. Where it would take her, she didn't know, but for now it was fine. It was enough.

Freckles' eyes were stars themselves—bright, blue, and glowing like the moon that reflected against bracken waves. She had finally settled on the other side of the boat, curling her tail around her, and Astrid started to trace patterns in the scales that glowed. At first she tried to see if it resembled any real constellation, but she gave up on that pretty quickly. In the end she wondered what shapes she could find.

Strangely enough, she saw an axe. But that was probably just in her head. And even if it was, there was no hero attached to its handle, no god wielding justice in a tale told for generations, its lessons immortalized in the skies.

Astrid wasn't a hero. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Her palm cradled the side of her head as she rested her elbows on her knees, sitting hunched over on the middle of the deck. The wind had begun to pick up and noise of it flapping against the sail was calming, if only to get her slightly out of the noise of her own thoughts. Flipping the dagger between her fingers, Astrid stared at the engravings that caught the moonlight until the shapes and lines were unrecognizable.

Tentatively, she placed the dagger underneath her bust. The edge barely poked between two ribs and she positioned it higher, turning her waist left and right as if she was modeling a dress for her mother instead of her own suicide plan.

Another sigh.

She moved the dagger and tapped it against the bone of her wrist—another tempting spot. Freckles' gave a whine and Astrid gave up, lifting her arms above her head in surrender. The dagger fell to the deck with a loud thud. "I won't," she promised, "And least right now," she added, so soft she was sure the dragon didn't hear.

Freckles growled.

Jeez. Tough crowd.

"Okay, I won't! Sheesh!" She amended, falling once more on her back against the deck. "I'll just wait until I starve or drown or die of some horrendous injury. Satisfied?"

Judging by the fact that the dragon finally laid down, Astrid figured she was.

The gods, however, were not. It seemed they were out for blood—specifically, her blood.

She had spoken far too soon.

The storm came out of nowhere. One minute, she was lying flat on her back as the boat rocked her to that well-chased sleep she was after and the next, a snap of lightning and a crack of thunder sent her heart into overdrive.

If there was one thing Astrid, or anybody for that matter, was not good at, it was navigating during a storm. With the wind whipping around and the rain hurling in _sideways,_ Astrid could barely see a thing. Screw trying to logically find the most northern island. If she didn't find some sort of safe haven soon, they'd drown.

Well, Astrid would drown. Freckles could always fly away. But as she tugged in the sails and tried to keep as much water out of her boat as possible, she noticed that Freckles did anything but. She would pace up and down the boat, using her weight to try and help Astrid in her endeavors, go after things that fluttered into the water and put them back in the boat, and simply stay by her side. It baffled her.

"Leave!" Astrid shouted, her voice mixing with another crack of thunder. "Fly away! You don't have to stay with me!"

Freckles opened her mouth and Astrid watched as it lit a faint purple and then _snap—_ another crack as the dragon shot lightning out of her mouth that exploded like glass shards high above into the stormy sky.

Cool, but, unhelpful; especially when it distracted her from the task of _not being thrown off the boat._

The boat rocked and Astrid reached out to grab the side of the boat when it suddenly jerked—the boat swayed violently the other way and she and Freckles' tumbled off the other side and into the ocean, but not before her shoulder caught the edge and something _shifted_ before her arm scraped gruffly against the wood in a last ditch effort to hang on.

The water was cold, colder than the rain. It made her muscles feel like lead and numbed her searing shoulder and arm. Figuring out which was up was hard and honestly, for those first few moments, Astrid wasn't sure it was worth breaking the surface. Her boat would surely be in ruins, her stuff-tossed away in the waters, and she had _nowhere_ to go. No goal. Gnat said to find a home, but who would want a stranger with a questionable past?

The water was cold, but that didn't have to be a bad thing.

But Astrid didn't have time to dwell on speeding up her apparent suicide. It seemed Freckles' was determined to keep her alive, no matter how high that tally might get. Somehow, the dragon had found the collar of Astrid's dress and pulled, nearly choking her, but pulled swiftly enough to drag the both of them out of the water and back on the amazingly un-capsized boat.

Astrid swore she coughed up a puddle's worth of water as the boat continued to sway. Her arms found the mast in the middle and she held on for dear life, despite the intense pain in her left arm. She watched through wet lashes as Freckle's found her knapsack of things and dragged it to the middle of the boat where she proceeded to sit on it before she nearly sat on Astrid, using her tail to keep her close.

"You're really not going to let me die, are you?" Astrid shouted: to the gods or Freckles', she wasn't entirely sure.

And just as quickly as the storm came, is started to pass. The boat still rocked and the rain still poured, but it didn't come in sideways and the wind wasn't about to rip a hole in the only sails she had. It seemed for now she could rest.

Minutes passed before Astrid felt comfortable letting go out of the mast. When she dared a look at her arm under the moonlight, she could already see the bruising on the shoulder, and the gash on her arm: it wasn't pretty. With a small whimper she fell back, expecting to meet the wet floor of her boat when instead she collided with the smooth scales of the dragon. Freckles was warm, not enough to rid the cold, but enough for her to finally, _finally_ , go to sleep.

"You're really not going to let me die," she repeated as she felt the dragon's tail wrap snugly around her.

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The next morning was the definition of a living nightmare.

The skies were clear, the temperature was surprisingly pleasant, and Astrid was a goddamn _wreck._ By sunrise,Astrid could tell that her arm was worse than she had anticipated: the gash was bruised and her shoulder was _definitely_ dislocated. The good news was that Astrid knew how to pop a shoulder back in place. The bad news was she had never tried to pop her own shoulder back in place.

All in all, nothing was good and everything was terrible.

Until she saw the sea stacks.

She remembered those sea stacks. Isak had pointed them out when she had tagged along on the men's last trip to the nearest trading post. He had given a boisterous laugh and said that at the right angle, it kind of looked like a shoe. Astrid hadn't dwelled on it, because she had concentrated on maneuvering the boat around them before they arrived at the island.

"Oh, thank every god," Astrid grunted as she tugged once more on the sails, steering her ship straight past the stacks. Her arm wasn't going to be able to hold out much longer and while she may be a murderer on the run, it was better than being a drowned murderer. At least, for her it was. If Freckles' was willing to risk her life _twice_ just to save Astrid's, she figured she might as well have the decency to at least try to keep herself alive for now.

So, people were good. People had supplies that could fix her arm, as well as food that wasn't soggy. But people also had axes and swords and other sharp stuff that would be very good at skinning poor Freckles alive, given they survived her supposed lightning fire blasts that she gave out. Point was, she didn't need a fight. Which means she couldn't exactly roll up to the island with what she might as well call her pet dragon.

"We'll have to go in on the other side of the island," Astrid told Freckles, adjusting the sails once more. The dragon cooed worriedly as her face screwed up in pain. "I'm fine," she assured her friend. "But you have to lay low." Astrid moved away and dug out a still-damp old tarp that had once been her old sail, a giant hole in the middle. She covered the dragon with it so only her snout poked out to allow her to breathe and instructed her to lay down. "You're used to lying low, so it shouldn't be a problem."

Astrid mumbled her plans and shopping list in her head, mentally trying to see what she had on her that she could barter with. Normally, she'd just fish—she still had her nets, but her arm was wrecked, and she couldn't do anything if she didn't get that taken care of that first. Her fingers dipped into the front of her dress and pulled out the pendant Gnat had given her when she left. In the sun, it shone more spectacularly, like leaves when the light caught them just right.

Beside her, Freckles whined.

"I'll try not to," Astrid said, tucking the pendant back underneath the dress. "But if it's the necklace or me, I'm picking the necklace." Instead, she stuffed her knapsack of other things she had grabbed from Gnat's house that she was willing to part with: a few spare carving knives that were buried on the bottom of the bag, a spare dress, and a…..hastily whittled carving of what looked like Freckles.

This time it was Astrid's turn to whine.

She really hoped these traders were in a good mood.

No one was on the west side of the island; it was nothing but a rocky cliff and not fitting for several boats docking. There was one tree that stood out, its trunk wedged between the boulders of the low cliff side, dangling over the water. The trunk bent just enough that Astrid could climb the mast of her boat and use rope to anchor the boat to the island. Wrapping the bow and arrow around her good shoulder with the knapsack, as well as slipping Gnat's knife into her boot, she began her climb. Her shoulder screamed in pain every step of the way, and the dragon's warbled cries didn't help either.

"I got it, I got it," Astrid said softly, her words lost in a pant as she used her good arm to haul herself up to straddle the hefty tree trunk. She tied and checked the knot three times before she looked down at Freckles who was still obediently hiding underneath the tarp. Her head poked up and she made soft noises Astrid's way. "I'll be back later." She checked the knot again as Freckles grew a bit restless. "Don't move," she said, pointing a threatening finger Freckles' way.

In response, the dragon rolled her eyes.

"Don't sass me either," she teased softly, blowing a raspberry.

Astrid took a deep breath and looked up. It was only twenty feet to the top, but with her arm in the shape that it was, it might as well have been two hundred. She folded her hands together and whispered a small prayer before she searched for the best handhold and grabbed on.

The first few feet weren't so bad; Astrid could almost stand with complete ease on some of the boulders that stuck out. But as she got higher, it was harder and harder to find decent hand and footholds, and her shoulder was really paying for the smooth surface.

"Remind me to jump off the damn thing on my way down," Astrid grunted down to Freckles, grabbing hold of a rock with her good arm. Taking a swan dive next to the boat was a much less dangerous risk than trying to scale her way back down with no injury.

From the boat, Freckles gave an almost too loud warning cry, forcing Astrid to look back down and give a loud hush. "No!" she whispered harshly. "No noise. Lay low. _Zip it_."

She continued her climb up and she was almost at the top when the handhold she had chosen with her good arm crumbled between her fingers and fell into the ocean. Freckles cried again as Astrid slid down about three feet until she grabbed a dangling tree root with her bad arm.

Her shoulder shifted again and she couldn't help but scream in pain.

"Holy hell," she whimpered, scrambling to get all her weight off that arm. She kicked around until she found her footing and then hoisted herself back up. It was now or never. If she kept testing her arm strength, she'd never make it to the top. Pain be damned, Astrid put herself into overdrive and hauled herself up the last eight feet until she managed to sprawl up on the top of the cliff, surrounded by the softest grass she'd ever laid on.

"I can't believe I made it," Astrid grunted, her eyes screwed in pain. When she finally braved a look at her bad arm, she nearly gagged—her already scraped arm had worsened in her little slip up, and her shoulder looked…..terrible. Now it was _clearly_ out of place. She couldn't even move it.

But still, she managed to crawl to the edge and look back down. Freckles' face relaxed instantly upon seeing Astrid. "I'm fine. I'll be back soon," she promised once more before she slipped into the forest and headed down hill to the beach where the trading post was.

Along the way Astrid busied herself with adjusting her clothes and picking the splinters out of her hand, as well as the grime out of her braid. She hadn't realized how terrible she must have smelled, and was really regretting that she didn't think to change her dress before she trekked up the cliff side.

The trading post was slightly bigger than she had remembered when she and Isak last visited, but there was one thing that was the same: it was dominated by big, burly men with scar-ridden faces and tattoos with no woman in sight.

Except her.

Astrid ran her tongue along her teeth and fiddled with her stuff as best she could—make the bow and arrows accessible, fix her bag so no one could grab it, and adjust her posture so she stood tall. Maybe if she looked like she belonged there, no one would give her any lip.

Maybe.

She felt their eyes on her instantly as she made her way through the thick of it; tents were lined up side to side, filled with an abundance of items that looked useful, sure, but not very useful for her. What she needed was a Gnat-looking tent, filled with unsoggy herbs and salves, bandages and needles, anything to fix her arm.

She was talking to a vendor selling vegetables when she felt someone's breath on the back of her neck, followed by a heavy arm that came to rest on her good shoulder. Startled, she dropped the vegetables and looked sideways to find a gangly man with yellowed teeth giving her a creepy smile.

"Hey there, sweetheart," he said, "Why don't you—"

Astrid yanked her shoulder away, taking a large step sideways. "Whatever it is, save it. I don't want hear it."

The man's smile faltered slightly. "Aw, come on. Don't be like that. Look, a young lady by yourself out in these parts, I can only assume—"

"Well, don't," Astrid cut in harshly. She really wished her good arm wasn't such a wreck, otherwise she'd consider punching this man into tomorrow. "I should really get going—"

He reached out and grabbed her wrist, _tight._

"Now wait just a goddamned minute—"

"Ah! There you are, darling. I've been looking everywhere for you."

The two of them whirled around to find a tall man with dark hair pulled back in a ponytail giving her a bright smile, dazzling and charming, one that complimented the blue tattooed pattern on his chin rather nicely.

The man let go of her immediately, looking rather put out. "She yours?"

Astrid was ready to fight, shoulder be damned. She sure as hell didn't kill her chief and flee her island just to be treated like property _again_. But just as she was thinking of ways to grab the knife tucked into her boot, the pony-tailed man laughed.

"I wouldn't phrase it like that, my friend. I am merely blessed she chose me to keep around." He reached for her hand and kissed her knuckles.

It was such a _line._ Gout had used others like it on all sorts of girls in the village all the time. But at least this guy was marginally less creepy than Mr. Yellow Teeth. So she held off on beating him to a pulp.

Clearly put out that she was apparently already _claimed_ (Bleh), the older guy gave up with a limp wave of his hand. "Ah, sorry mate. Didn't know." And just like that, he was gone.

"You should really be more careful," the pony-tailed man said, his voice already sounding less suave and forced. "A lot of guys around here haven't seen a woman in months." He sniffed, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. "While you're here, just say you're with me. That should keep them off your back."

"Oh, _really?"_ With her good arm, she put her hand on her hip. "Why's that?"

He grinned. "You're gorgeous, _I'm_ gorgeous. Fits that we'd go together."

Astrid rolled her eyes and nearly turned around, ready to stomp off, when he laughed. "Aw, come on, I'm not going to do anything. You know, unless you want me to."

She looked him up and down. "And I assume you usually get permission?"

"She's catching on!" He winked. "Like I said, people like us, we're gorgeous. Just know you can change your mind at any time."

"No thanks," she said grimly. "I'm good."

"As the lady wishes." A pause. "You've dislocated your shoulder," he said and Astrid couldn't help but roll her eyes.

"I know," she said flatly. "I can feel it."

The man laughed lightly. "Sorry, where are my manners? The name's Eret, son of Eret. Who might you be, all alone at such a trading post?"

Astrid stiffened, suddenly feeling threatened. Sure, it could have just been a question, but then again, how could she know his intentions? She wasn't that far from Fogg—maybe word had already spread about what she had done. It likely hadn't; it had only been a few days since she'd left, but she wasn't going to take any chances. From here on, her identity needed to be protected.

"Rune," she lied after some thought. Eret gave her a look like he knew she was lying, but didn't press. "And I think it's obvious why I'm here." She gestured to her shoulder.

His eyes never left her shoulder and he used one finger pressed to her sternum, pushing her back a few steps. Frantically, Astrid looked left and right, evaluating her situation and looking for ways out before the calves of her legs bumped into the back of a barrel sitting underneath the adjacent tent.

"Relax," Eret said, sounding exasperated. Her moved his finger and pushed on her good shoulder. "Sit down."

Her eyes narrowed skeptically, but she did what he asked. Astrid stared at him intently as he moved to stand beside her, both his hands braced on her shoulder. "On the count of three. One-"

"-whoa, no wait what are you-"

"-two-"

"-no, no, I don't-"

"-three."

Astrid yelped as Eret jerked her shoulder back into place. "Don't move. Hold on. One more." There was another crack and then the pain was entirely gone. "There. Back in its socket where it belongs."

Tentatively, Astrid rolled her shoulder back and forth, testing Eret's handiwork. It really seemed that everything was back in its place. "Oh. It's good. Thanks."

"Sure, but I'm afraid that's all the help I can give." He gestured to her wounded arm. "I can't sew." Eret dragged an empty crate and turned it upside down before he took a seat on it. From his hip, he grabbed a large canteen and unscrewed the cap and took a hearty sip before he offered it to her. "Mead?"

She was too thirsty to allow her pride to get in the way. She gave a small smile as she grabbed the canteen, taking an equally large sip. It dribbled down the side of her mouth and she gave a soft sigh as she wiped her chin with the back of her hand before handing him his canteen back. "Thanks. I needed a drink."

His nose wrinkled like he had just noticed her appearance—though she was sure the whole post smelled her when she walked in. "Yeah, thought you might. So, what's your real name?"

Astrid stiffened.

"Relax," Eret repeated, his tone reminiscent of Bugeyes: no nonsense, all business. He took another sip of mead. "I know your past is shady. Never met a woman drifting alone whose past wasn't." A shrug. "Don't matter to me, we're cut from the same cloth."

It slipped from her lips before she could catch it. "I severely doubt that."

He grinned a devilish grin. "Yeah? I wouldn't be so sure. Let me guess: pirate's daughter."

"No."

"Thief."

"No. And that's pretty much the same thing."

"Is not. Hmm. You're not strong enough to be some sort of disgraced, ex-warrior—"

Astrid wrinkled her nose. "I'm stronger than I look," she huffed.

Eret looked her up and down, stroking his chin in thought. His smile became more playful. "Yeah? Well, are you looking for a job?"

She snorted. "I'm sure I won't be interested in whatever pirate schemes you have."

Grabbing his middle, Eret gave a bellowing laugh. "Hey now, I run a respectable business. You're looking at the finest trapper south of the archipelago." He offered her another sip of the mead, which she accepted graciously.

Astrid's brow rose in surprise, mouth posed over the opening of the canteen. "Trapper? Trapper of….what, exactly?"

"Dragons, of course."

She nearly choked on her drink.

"Dragons…" she repeated. Discreetly, her eyes scanned the rest of the post, praying she wouldn't find her scaly friend ignoring orders and bumming through the tents. "There are hardly any dragons this far south. I've never seen them."

"Then I'm still the best trapper in the south, yeah?" He winked. "But I'm the best up north, too. You ever been north?"

Astrid shook her head and handed the canteen back. "No. But I was thinking of heading that way."

"Well, be careful." Eret's grin slipped a bit, his expression sobering as he took his own sip of mead. "I don't know what little dinky fishing village you're from, but the rumors are true: there are dragons everywhere up north. It's my job to catch them and keep them away from the dragon riders."

 _That_ had Astrid's attention. "Dragon riders? People ride them?"

Her curiosity was mistaken for disgust on Eret's part. "Horrendous, I know. There's one rogue one that's been causing several trouble for years, and then there's _Berk."_

"Berk?"

"Home to the Hairy Hooligans. Took down a massive Stoker Class dragon, with the help of a Night Fury, no less."

Astrid blinked. This was all new information to her. She'd never heard of Berk, Hairy Hooligans, or any real information on dragons before. What was a Night Fury? "You're speaking an entirely different language," she joked.

He kept looking off into the distance. "They're supposed to be here, you know. The Vikings from Berk," Eret continued, looking around. "Drago said to look out for them for avoidance, not confrontation, but _man_ would I love to slug one in the mouth. It's only a matter of time before they make business a nightmare, I'm sure."

"What are they here for?"

Eret sighed, fiddling with his canteen. "Beats me. Supplies like the rest of us, I'd bet. But what they can't get closer to home, I don't know. Maybe that storm wiped out the posts up north. I heard it did quite the number on a few islands."

All this talk of Berk had her squirming with interest. How did one ride a dragon? It seemed an impossible task, even with a dragon as sweet and tame as Freckles. But somehow….Gnat got off that island, right?

Nah, she couldn't have.

...Could she?

"Well, I should get back to work," he declared. "Drago should be back soon with that boat deal any hour now."

Drago. He spoke of him like she was supposed to know who he was. She knew she had been asking a lot of questions, but she couldn't help it; and besides, Eret didn't seem to mind answering them. "Um…who is Drago?"

He stared at her, wide-eyed. "You've never heard of Drago Bludvist?" She shook her head. "Good. Keep it that way. You don't want to get in his way."

Astrid nodded. No more questions. She wasn't entirely sure she wanted to learn anything else about him. "Thanks for the…..thanks for fixing my shoulder," she said as Eret stood up and dusted his arms off before he took his canteen and emptied the remains of his mead all over Astrid's open wounds. She hissed in pain.

"To stop infection. Like I said, sorry I couldn't help with the arm." He didn't look all that apologetic. "But I'd get that sewn up soon. I'd hate to see a pretty girl like you have to get it hacked off."

She fixed him with a flat look. "I'm sure."

He gave her one last wink. "Like I said, if you change your mind—"

"I won't."

"You say that now! Until we meet again, _Rune."_

As he sauntered away she realized she had never given him her real name like he asked. And as harmless as he turned out to be she was sort of glad.

Once Eret left, however, she felt the eyes back on her. The vendor fixed her with a look that had her jumping to her feet and scurrying out of the tent, back out into the mid-afternoon sun. In the sunlight, her wounded arm shone a sickly color, stinging with the mead that he had poured on it before he left.

A horrifying image of her having to use her dragon to essentially melt her arm off came to the forefront of her mind and Astrid decided she wasn't above begging if it meant getting some damn medicine to fix her arm.

She was by another vendor, looking at different ingredients for salve (she was sure there was a recipe in that book Gnat had given her, if and only the pages survived the rain) when another man approached her. But unlike before with Mr. Yellow Teeth, his presence wasn't threatening, though his stature was rather….huge. A large, calloused hand dangled salve right in front of her eyes before she looked up to meet the face of what she could only describe as a gentle giant.

His smile was close-lipped and soft, hidden behind the massive course curls of his thick red beard. Cheeks red with sun, he took off his helmet with one hand while the other one continued to hold the salve out to her. "Need help with your arm?"

The vendor, seemingly recognizing the man, exchanged pleasantries while Astrid stood there baffled. "Ah, Stoick! Haven't seen you in some time. Didn't think you came this far south these days, you know…considering."

Stoick laughed, but it didn't have the same mirth as his smile had. "I took the old boat. Heard the trappers were down here, didn't want to risk it."

Astrid briefly wondered if Eret and his men attacked ships. Maybe that's why Stoick had to bring one of his old boats instead of the newer ones.

"Need anything in particular?" The vendor asked.

A shake of his head. "For me, no. Just asking around, trying to help my son with his endless little searches."

"Usually you leave your boy to those searches."

"He needs the practice of holding down the fort. Plus, it felt good to be out on sea again. Didn't realize how much I missed the open water. But anyway, you still have that kit you carry around with you?"

"For you, always," the man said before he rummaged through his things and pulled out a kit that had what she had been craving: a needle and thread.

Stoick put a hand on her shoulder and instantly, she relaxed. For whatever reason, she trusted his touch. "Come on lass, let's find someplace with good light. My stitches aren't so good, but they've saved a limb or two."

He guided her to a far off stone, away from all the vendors. Astrid watched with silent, rapt attention as he delicately cradled her arm in his and began the stitches. The pain was prickling and intense, not completely unlike her shoulder, and she worried her lip between her teeth in an attempt to stop whimpering.

"Aye, lass, I know it hurts," he said gently. "I won't be long. What's your name?"

She didn't feel like lying, not to him. "Astrid."

He smiled, but kept his eyes down. "How'd you hurt the arm?"

"Got thrown from my boat during the storm," she answered honestly. His smile instantly disappeared. "Could have been worse."

"True," he agreed softly as Astrid fought a wince. "You and your family are very lucky to be alive."

Her breath hitched and it was enough to make Stoick pause in his work. He looked up at her with sad eyes and gave a long sigh, patting one of her knees. "Sorry, kid…"

"I'll be fine," she told him. While his help was appreciated, his pity was…unwanted. Though it might have been too late. "I've got other family not too far. I'm heading that way now."

He looked past her, down by the main docks. "Which one is your boat?"

She picked one of the sadder boats and hoped he'd believe her. "That one," she said, pointing to the one with the ugly crest.

"Huh. I didn't notice you had stowed away."

Her eyes screwed shut and she groaned. Of course she had picked _his boat._ "Sorry. Mine's….on the east side of the island," she lied. "I was a little afraid to arrive by myself."

"I understand," Stoick said, concentrating once more on the sutures. "It must be tough to be a young lady by herself on the open seas." He paused, taking a deep breath. There were words on the tip of his tongue, she was sure of it: she could see his hesitation. "My wife," he finally began, "My wife disappeared some time ago. I've always hoped she was somewhere out there."

Astrid looked down at her arm, noticing the straight lines of the sutures: they were far neater than he gave himself credit. "I hope…" she said softly, drawing Stoick's attention. "I'm hope she met men as kind as you to help her when she needed it," and she gave him her best smile—quiet, gently, genuine.

He reached over and patted her head once, twice. "That's the dream. If I show some kindness, maybe others will as well. Thank you, Astrid."

A silence swept over them as he finished up and just in time, too: there was a rustling in the leaves. Stoick didn't hear it—he was too concentrated on her arm—but when Astrid looked over she saw a nearby bush move.

Two dark and familiar ears poked out before a pair of bright blue eyes shone eerily through the leaves.

Oh, hell.

She was going to kill that dragon if someone else didn't kill it first.

"Stoick!" she said suddenly, and his attention briefly snapped up to hers. He was almost done with the last of the stitches. "So, uh, where are you from?"

Whatever he said went in one ear and out the other. Astrid's gaze looked past his massive mountain of a shoulder to the rustling bushes. Freckles further pushed her head out and looked left and right before she scurried out and hid in the next closest bush that _barely_ hid her body.

She was going to get herself skinned alive, damn it.

"…so I left him in charge." He finished up by wrapping her arm in a bandage. "There! All done!"

Astrid didn't hesitate to leap to her feet. Hastily, she reached around for her bag and dug through her things, trying to find something to give Stoick in thanks. From the corner of her eye she noticed the bush rustling again, the noise masked by two men fighting over a bartering agreement a few yards away. "Uhh…here," she fumbled, trying to find the best of her small knives to give him.

Stoick gave a boisterous laugh. "I don't need anything from you, lass. In fact…" he reached into his own bag and pulled out a few things: mainly some fruit, some water, and a bar of soap. "Take this. I can easily get more."

"Oh, no, I couldn't…"

He dropped them in her bag despite her protest. "I insist."

"I must smell really bad, huh?"

He laughed again. "Only a little."

"…Thanks." She whispered. Her eyes darted to the bushes which had stilled but she swore she could still see that stupid dragon's ears sticking out. Astrid needed to leave, sooner than later. "Wait," she said hurriedly, reaching into her bag. As she dug for what she was looking for, Stoick's attention was captured by the two men whose argument had turned into a full blown brawl. "Where is it…." She mumbled.

"I should really break that up," he sighed, seemingly already regretting what he had not yet started.

The bushed rustled again and then Freckles _walked out she was heading into the middle of the trading post oh my god._

Stoick kept rambling about the fight, eyes far to the side, as Astrid finally caught Freckles' attention. "No!" she mouthed fiercely, using one hand to gesture to the forest. Freckles paused and backed up slowly, towards the forest. "Go away!" she mouthed, eyes lit with anger.

Freckles paused and tilted her head.

 _"MOVE!"_ she mouthed.

Her antics finally went noticed. "Astrid are you—"

"Here it is!" Astrid all but yelled as she grabbed the whittled dragon Gnat had carved and thrusted it into Stoick's hands. Freckles jumped back in the bush just in time. "A gift from me to you. For fixing my arm."

Despite the fight he was itching to break up, he managed to look away and give her a smile. He glanced briefly down at the carving and then back up at her. "Thank you, Astrid," he said stuffing the dragon carving in his bag without another look. "Take care."

With that, they went their separate ways: Stoick to break up the fight and Astrid, to prevent what would surely be another if anyone saw that dragon.

"I said to stay put!" She hissed, roughly shoving Freckles back into the forest. Every few steps she would turn around to see if anyone had followed them: it seemed everyone was too preoccupied with that fight that had broken out. "Do you know what would happen if someone saw you, you big stupid salamander?"

Freckles whined out something that sounded like quite the pathetic argument.

"That's no excuse." She pinched the dragon's ear; in turn, Freckles flung her ear right back, whacking Astrid in the cheek with it, stinging her skin pink. "I was fine. I said I'd be back! You're so impatient!" she growled, rubbing at her face before she laid a hand on Freckles' back. "Come on. Let's go before we get caught."

As they raced back to the west side of the island, swan diving off the cliff like she'd promised herself (but not before throwing her bag onto the deck), Astrid hurried to ready her boat to set sail. With the supplies Stoick had given her, she was sure that she could make it a few more days until she found shelter on an island: uninhabited this time, if she was lucky.

She was going to do this. She and Freckles were going to survive.

.

.

.

Hours later, back at the trading post and unbeknownst to her, Stoick finally took a _real_ look at the whittled carving she had gifted to him.

And he was _stunned._

"How could she….unless….unless she's _seen_ …"

He ran as fast as he could to the east end of the island, shouting her name. But when he got there he saw nothing but a smooth and empty horizon.

He gripped the Night Fury carving in his hand and heaved a heavy sigh.

.

end part two

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 ** _AN:_** _hi! this took a little longer than I wanted it to take, but I got it out at the end of the month like I had hoped! she met eret and stoick but it'll still be a few more chapters until she meets hiccup. but it'll happen! I also only touched on it this chapter, but astrid will wrestle more with what she's done as well. All the other chapters should be about this much in length, so sorry if the shorter word count is disappointing. I hope you guys like it and if you have any questions just let me know and I'll answer them as best I can. Please, if you liked it, leave a comment. I always need the encouragement for multi-chapter stories. Thanks!_


	3. Chapter 3

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eulogy for home

part three / / bite your own teeth

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Back on Fogg, one of the first things every child learned was the difference between a Whistler and Artist's Agony.

The two were very similar looking spiders unique to the island. To the untrained eye, they might be considered the same spider: they were both made of red, blue, and purple rings, but the only difference was the order. Harmless Whistler spiders' rings went red, blue then purple, while the poisonous Artist's Agony went red, purple, _and then_ blue. The poison was extremely painful, but not deadly, and even though everyone was taught the difference, people still got bit from time to time. It was always terrible-Bugeyes got bit once, she remembered, when he got too close trying to figure out what it was and he had screamed himself so hoarse he couldn't speak for three days.

But Gnat had taught her an easier way of knowing the difference without getting too close. A few months before she left, Gnat had pulled her aside to show her a spider web, its owner sitting smack dab in the middle.

 _"_ _Yeah?"_ She had said, unable to see the point. _"What about it?"_

Gnat had used her walking stick to meticulously point out the pattern. Without using her words to describe it, Astrid had frustratingly talked herself into figuring out the shape of Gnat's choosing for ten minutes before she finally said whatever word Gnat wanted her to say.

 _"_ _Triangle?"_

She had nodded and took Astrid's hand to bring her closer to her. She'd watched with absolute horror as Gnat picked up the spider without studying the rings whatsoever and let it crawl all over her hand.

 _"_ _What are you-!"_ But then Astrid had realized. She would never endanger her. _"Oh,"_ and Gnat had passed her the Whistler spider. Its fuzzy legs were somehow calming as they danced along her palm. It wasn't as scary as it was before. _"You can tell from the web which is which. Whistler's have triangle webs?"_

And after that, it was easier to tell. Astrid taught the trick to everyone. Fewer and fewer men chopping lumber got bit every year.

So as Astrid currently finished sketching the every detail of the butterfly wing, she dwelled on how important it was to mark every detail. Every change in color, every different shape could be the difference between life and death; well, or at least savory versus unpalatable. She was pretty sure Freckles had figured out which of the colorful butterflies didn't taste so good.

Astrid finished shading in the left butterfly wing before she turned the book around, resting its spine on top one of her knees. "Whatcha think?"

Freckles gave her maybe a half a second of her attention before her eyes went back to following the _actual_ butterfly that Astrid had been sketching for the past few minutes. A small smile graced her lips as the butterfly flew over to the dragon and rested smack dab in the middle of her nose. The soft blue color of her wings fluttered gently like sails in a soft breeze as Freckles sat comically still, eyes crossed. Astrid had a hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter as the butterfly moved to rest on a nearby weed and Freckles took to mocking the gentle flutter of the butterfly's wings wither her own: a hysterical display. But seconds later Freckles gave up on the game and pounced—she missed—pupils blowing up and her tail wagging back and forth behind her.

With a soft shake of her head, Astrid turned the book back over and looked over the sketch. There were tons of blank pages in Gnat's book of All Things Plants, and while they were stiff with water stains on the corners from the storm that blew her off her own boat eight months ago, it was still good readable and usable. At first, Astrid didn't know what to do with the pages. It was all the parchment she had and it should have probably been used sparingly. But months of silence gave way to boredom, which blossomed into a newfound curiosity once she and Freckles found the small island they were currently living on.

The island was small, too small for any real community to live on, but perfectly sized for a runaway murderer and her dragon friend. There was plenty of clean water, shade from the trees, and a ton of bugs that Astrid had never seen before. Bugs weren't a new thing to her—Fogg was covered in them, probably more so than any other island that south of the archipelago. More than once Astrid found herself lying in her meadow sanctuary only to have a beetle or a grasshopper or something that didn't even have a name crawling along her arm. So bugs weren't new to her: but the butterflies were.

Astrid had seen them a few times, but only ever around Gnat's house. She said it was because of the flowers she had, but Astrid had looked in the book and couldn't recall what they looked like. Maybe back when she first left, she would have remembered, but all the time she had spent alone had done a number on her memory. She was finding it harder and harder to remember what home was.

Of course, there were things that she still remembered vividly: the blanket of Fogg that covered the island that morning, the rough feeling of Gout's hands on her neck, the slope of his jaw as he lied on the ground, the shade of red dripping out of his nose….

Gnat's face when she said goodbye.

So, Astrid drew. When she wasn't adding bugs to accompany the collection of plants in Gnat's book, she used the back pages to sketch what she remembered. It took a few tries, but with a newfound patience she managed to capture Bugeyes in his forge, her own boat against the docks and then…Gnat. Just Gnat. Astrid drew Gnat whenever she could. She drew her how she remembered, how she imagined. She drew her straight-faced and she drew her laughing.

She drew her so she wouldn't forget.

Freckles whined and Astrid looked up from the book with a soft shake of her head. It seemed the butterfly's constant evasion was starting to get on her dragon's nerves. Glancing back down, her thumb fingered the edges of the pages and she itched to go back and work on her latest sketch of Gnat, but she willed herself to keep working on the butterfly sketch. Remembering Gnat was important, but Astrid didn't want to encroach on obsessive territory. It would only leave her heartbroken in the end.

She was focusing on the right wing, making notes on the eventual coloring she'd get around to when Freckles butted against her head with her nose. "I'm almost done," she chuckled, pushing the dragon back with one palm splayed against her snout. Freckles went cross-eyed again, and then pushed Astrid once more, this time knocking her pencil out of her hand. Determined little shit.

"You have no patience, you know that?" Astrid smiled as Freckles crouched on the ground, her but to the ground and her tail wagging incessantly. With a gentle roll of her eyes, Astrid set the notebook in her knapsack and her dragon gurgled excitedly. "Okay, fine. You win. Let's go."

The dress she wore that day was one of two that she owned; it was baggy, shapeless, and bland, yet comfortable. It slipped off easily over her head as they walked through the thickest part of the small woods toward the small waterfall. She fished through her bag and pulled out some soap she had bartered for before she folded her dress best she could and shoved it in there with her other things: the book, a few carrot sticks, spare clothes and the carving knife with Gnat's name.

Once they got to the waterfall, Freckles took the small eight foot jump straight into the water while Astrid lingered behind, sitting on the edge of the rocks in her underwear. After a few weeks of habitually putting on breast bindings every morning, Astrid realized she didn't need to be wearing them—it's not like there was any use for them here, all alone. But she found it hard to break the habit, so she kept wearing them. Clothes were harder to find at trading posts, especially things that fit her, so Astrid had been going out of her way to take extra care of the clothes that Gnat had given her before she left.

Freckles splashing was almost deafening as Astrid pulled out her dress and inspected it for any new holes or frays that needed any attention. Once she decided it wasn't in need of her shoddy attempts at sewing, she set the dress aside and went about unraveling her bindings before she slipped off her underwear and stood up, looking down at an unsuspecting dragon.

She grabbed the soap. "Geronimo!" she bellowed, jumping down and landing ungracefully in the water with a big splash. The pool underneath the fall wasn't deep, but it was deep enough—enough for Freckles to wade through it and enough for Astrid to jump in with knocking her knees against any rocks. But while she was safe from rocks, she wasn't safe from the dragon's tail which whacked her a bit as she surfaced, knocking the soap out of her hand.

"Hey!" she cried, spouting water from her mouth, aiming for one of Freckles' eyes. "Watch where you swing your stupid tail, asshole."

Astrid laughed as Freckles hit her again with said stupid tail, gently but purposefully. "Hold on." She said taking deep breath and dipping completely underneath the water. The current was slow and she managed to grab the soap before it rolled down the rocks towards the bottom of the single-hill island.

She surfaced with a gasp, shaking the water from her lashes and wiping away the stray hairs that had fallen out of her braid and plastered to her face. With her free hand, she loosened her braid and let her hair fall out, the sensation calming. She had a thought.

"Maybe I should cut it," she said aloud, drawing Freckles' attention as Astrid swam lazily to one of the rocks underneath the waterfall. The best one was covered in moss and made an excellent cushion. Her hair was heavy as she heaved herself up and suddenly, she wanted nothing more than to be free of it. There was no reason to really have it so long, not anymore. She'd learned long ago how to pick out the traders who didn't give a damn about traditions and expectations, and figured no one would bat an eye if she showed up next time with half the hair she used to.

Her eyes drifted up through the curtain of water, longing for her knife hidden in her bag. Maybe she'd cut it later, after she'd washed up.

The soap Astrid had was...okay. It did its job. She simply had to accept that she'd never be able to find the soap that Stoick had given her that one day back at the market. It had a faint smell of something….earthy, a wisp of something sweet, but it was so subtle, she was never able to tell what it was. The soap she got now did the trick, but it didn't smell nearly so pleasant.

Stoick. She thought of him, every once in a while. Eret, too. She had a few sketches of them...Stoick's beard was never as magnificent as it had been in person, and Eret's tattoo looked different every time. Her memory was fuzzy, but she would always remember their kindness.

As she washed up, somewhat lost in her thoughts, she watched Freckles splash about. The waterfall was by far her favorite part of the island and Astrid thought it strange that a dragon with _wings_ seemed to love swimming more than flying. Gnat had mentioned offhandedly that Freckles didn't fly much—and as the months went on, she saw that it was true. For whatever reason, Freckles didn't fly much.

Rinsing the suds away underneath the waterfall, Astrid made a pact with herself that one day, she'd learn why.

Astrid made a series of clicking noises, followed by a gentle whistle. Freckles' ears shot up and her pupils widened as she quirked her head to the side. She repeated the noises before the dragon finally took the hint and swam over to meet her as she jumped off the rocks and went to wade in the shallower parts of the water where she could stand.

"That's a good girl," she cooed gently as Freckles came to splash beside her. Soap in hand, Astrid began lathering the dragon up. Sometimes it seemed unnecessary to wash a dragon, but Freckles always looked content to have her head scratched and her ears rubbed. So it couldn't _hurt._

Well, not entirely. It probably wasn't good that she tried to keep eating the soap.

"Stop!" Astrid said as sternly as her budding laughter would allow. "Dumbass. If you eat the soap, you'll be hiccupping bubbles for a week."

In response, Freckles tried to lick the soap off her own back.

Astrid forfeited the lecture. The dragon wouldn't be getting any sympathy from her.

A few bubbles formed and floated into the slightly stale ale of the forest surrounding the water. Astrid watched as they went higher and higher, some weaving between the leaves on the trees before they popped, one by one. Freckles paid no mind, shaking her ears and diving back to play in the water once more and subsequently creating a splash that knocked her pendant up to smack her on the bottom of her chin.

Her pendant had instantly become her most prized possession, something she held dearer than her own axe. She wasn't sure if she could ever part with Gnat's necklace, even if her life depended on it.

But she didn't anticipate their ever being a real need to trade it, not in the foreseeable future. Being on her own was, logistically, easier than she had anticipated. She was capable of feeding herself and looking after herself just fine, but psychologically…Astrid could admit she felt the toll. At home she felt lonely, bored, and sometimes even more frightened than she did out on this island by herself but still. Astrid had taken for granted the simple satisfaction of even the most mundane conversation. The only voice she heard anymore was her own. And even if she only really spoke to Freckles, complete and utter silence was something she just couldn't get used to.

She wondered how Gnat did it for all those years.

Another splash snapped her out of her thoughts and she thought of the clothes she needed to wash. The high afternoon sun that she had lamented for hours was finally starting to shift and Astrid forced herself to wade out of the pool and climb up the back of the waterfall to the top of the cliff where her things were. Her fingers grazed her knife and she thought about her hair, briefly, but ended up pushing both that idea and the knife aside. Without much thought she tossed her clothes over the cliff and let them fall in the water, despite Freckles best attempt to catch them.

"Soap…" she said aloud, patting the mossy grass beside her. "Where'd I put the…"

From below, Freckles hiccupped.

"Dumbass dragon."

.

.

.

The shelter she made was a replica of Gnats—at least as close as she could get it.

Astrid knew enough to make a basic structure. But even with Freckles help, there was no way she could lift enough logs to make something as stable as she did. In retrospect, someone had made her that hut back on Fogg. That or it used to be a healer's from generations ago.

It was small, almost the size of her bedroom back home and only had three walls with a makeshift door made from an old sailing tarp a fisherman gave her when she went to a market months back. The roof was woven sticks and covered in leaves. She and Freckles fit snug, and there was just enough room for her things to be shoved hastily in the corner. There was no need for a hearth—if she wanted to fry fish, Freckles would just start the fire.

Maybe in the end, it wasn't much like her hut at all.

But small as it was, it was still what she called home. As she and her dragon arrived back, Astrid clean in spare dry clothes and Freckles still hiccupping bubbles, she immediately went to hanging up her clean clothes on the line she had made.

"You hungry?" she asked as she wrung the bottom of the dress out to try and help it from sagging too much. The wind was minimal so she hoped her underwear was safe from being blown off into the grass.

Freckles crooned in response and seconds later she was laughing as Freckles grabbed the bottom of her tunic and tugged her towards the shore of the island.

"One moment, one moment!" she pried her shirt away and headed over to their hut to trade out her things. Her bag fell with a heavy thud and she pulled out her pencils and Gnat's book and set them aside. She glanced at her fishing net and sighed before she looked back.

"You're gonna help me, right? So I don't need this."

Freckles gave a gummy smile in return.

Abandoning the net, she grabbed her bag and stuffed it with another spare carving knife and a hook. She used to keep a lot of her things on the boat back on Fogg but in the event of a storm, she wasn't living in a village where she could simply go and get another because half her stuff fell into the sea. It was better that she kept them as far away from the salt as possible anyway.

While Freckles hurried along, Astrid lingered behind, watching as the dragon would stretch out her wings and glide to hurry herself along. She was sitting impatiently on the boat when Astrid got there. With a quick scan of the horizon to check if it was empty, she adjusted the sails and took off into a vast and endless sea.

As luck would have it, the air was just as stale out on the water as it was on land. It didn't really matter; they were only trying to get some fish and Astrid didn't want to be out for too long anyway. Best to be close to the island. Winter was settling in at an alarming rate and while she hadn't felt it, she could see it—the end of days snuck up on her sooner and sooner as the weeks went by.

There was plenty of daylight to fish by, though. Especially with Freckles' help. "Go ahead," Astrid said, her voice impossibly soft. Her mouth quirked into a slow, crooked grin as Freckles rocked the boat when she leaned out, her eyes scanning the soft waves of the ocean. Her eyes darted once, twice, three times before she spread her wings and dove in for her catch.

The first time the dragon did this, Astrid panicked: she thought Freckles was leaving her for good and she'd get tossed overboard in the process. But she returned moments later with a mouthful of still-living fish in her mouth, plopping half a dozen of them on the deck of the boat to flop around. She was stunned silent until one of the fish floundered so much it smacked her leg, and then she laughed.

Resisting the urge to spear it for of accidentally spearing her own boat, Astrid waited for the fish to get less…floppy before she grabbed one by the tail and hooked it by the mouth.

"You can have the rest," she said, and Freckles didn't hesitate to gobble them all up, one by one. Her laugh was lost in the flapping of the sail as a gust of wind passed through. Her still damp hair fluttered in the breeze and she reached behind her to braid it quickly, hoping it wouldn't get too knotted or end up smelling like fish.

As Freckles kept fishing to her heart's desire, Astrid took a seat at the back of the boat, hanging her fish up out of dragon's reach. She'd start a fire and fry it when she got back, but there was something about today that made food unappetizing. Maybe she'd just wait until morning.

The sail continued to flutter gently in the breeze, and the rocking of the boat was calming. Astrid couldn't imagine her life as someone who got seasick. There was something soothing about the open water, like a mother's embrace. At least on a cloudless day like this. Her eyes scanned the horizon and she saw clean lines, nothing but blue on blue, and it put her mind at ease.

Freckles gave another hiccup as she tried to swallow her umpteenth fish and Astrid gave her one last smile before she closed her eyes and fell asleep.

.

.

.

When she woke up, she thought she was still caught in a dream.

She had to have been asleep for hours. The sky was pitch black and glittered with more stars than she had ever seen. The water was other-worldly, calm to a point she'd never known and full of bright blue creatures that made the water glow for miles. It was enchanting, something she couldn't have even dreamt up.

"Freckles," she whispered, eyes still on the water. She squinted through the algae like glow and spotted a jellyfish, alien and magnificent in its size. "Freckles, you—"

When she looked away from the splendor of it all, Freckles was gone.

Astrid was alone on her boat.

"Freckles?" she whispered before the dread set in. Her fingers gripped the side of the boat as the light from the water cast eerie shadows on her face. "Freckles!" she shouted, but it felt useless. Surely she would have felt the boat rock when the dragon jumped in the water, or she would have come up for air by now which meant…

Freckles flew away.

Her eyes immediately took to the sky.

But the whole thing was stupid. There was no way she could spot Freckles at night, especially a night like this. The dragon's scales took on a more lustrous shine at night and she'd blend in perfectly on a clear night like this. But Astrid had a feeling it was all for naught—Freckles probably flew away a long time ago.

With a deep breath that made air in her lungs feel as heavy as water, Astrid adjusted her position on the boat and laid flat against the deck to keep her eyes on the sky. The glow from the water dance in her peripherals but she kept her eyes up, trying to find the stories in the sky her people told her. Her mother used to tell them to her, back before she got sick. No one was as good a storyteller as her. Astrid's favorite was always the tale of the Great Archer who protected the world from above with his bow and arrow made of stars.

 _"_ _If you look carefully enough, you can still see him fighting for us. Look, look," her mother whispered, her breath hot on her ear as she pulled Astrid close. "Do you see that?" she asked, pointing to a shooting star. "He shot another arrow."_

 _"_ _What's he shooting at, Mama?"_

 _"_ _If all is well, we'll never know."_

Astrid sighed. "Where were you that day…" she confessed to the soft breeze, closing her eyes. She tried to remember her mother's face, but it was hard these days. She couldn't even remember her voice. But she always remembered what she said. And she supposed, that had to count for something.

When she opened her eyes, a shooting star shot across the sky.

Two arms raised above her, Astrid mimed drawing an arrow on a bow, closing one eye in feigned concentration before she set free the imaginary arrow with a soft _swoosh_ that passed between chapped lips. She pretended it hit its target, a small red-looking star near the moon when not one, but half a dozen stars shot across the sky. The constellations she loved became jumbled as the stars went left to right, then up and down, dancing in all sorts of patterns that were in no way one of the Great Archer's arrows.

"….Freckles?"

Moments later, Freckles appeared back on the deck, swaying the boat and forcing Astrid to sit up and grasp the side. The dragon's pupils were blown in the dark of night, but she still saw the bright blue ring of her eyes, the same color as the creatures in the sea below. As she drew her wings in, Astrid tried to count the scales that glowed indigo from underneath her skin.

"Hey," Astrid whispered. Her throat felt too dry as the dragon shuffled over and settled her head in Astrid's lap, looking up at her with an emotion she couldn't decipher. "I thought you left."

 _I thought you left_ me.

Freckles continued to stare at her.

"It's okay, you know," she admitted, her hand finding its way atop the dragon's head, scratching her behind the ears then down underneath her chin. "You don't have to stay with me, you can leave."

Freckles cooed before she stretched out her wings and used one of them to wrap Astrid protectively like a blanket would.

"I killed someone." she whispered. The sea was empty, not a soul could hear her, but the words were so vile, she feared if she spoke too loud the wind might carry them away. "I _killed_ someone."

Her friend nuzzled closer.

"I didn't have a choice," she said, hugging the dragon as best she could. "I thought I could pretend that it was an accident, that I didn't _mean_ to but," she sighed. "I didn't have a choice, you know?"

But there's always a choice.

And the thought of that makes her chest feel impossibly heavy.

"Have you ever killed anyone?" she asked quietly, trying to think of anything but her own morality. Her calloused hands ran along the underside of Freckles' jaw. "Is that why you stick with me? Because you understand?"

Her toothless mouth gave her hand a lick and Astrid had a hard time believing that Freckles could have killed anyone, even if she was a dragon.

"I wish it wasn't so complicated," Astrid admitted. "I wish….we could go home. And check on Gnat. I hope she's okay."

Freckles perked up at the mention of Gnat's name.

She tore her gaze away from the dragon and looked past the glow of the water to the dark and undiscernible horizon. Sometimes the dragon's eyes were so innocent, it made Astrid feel like a sham. "If anything ever happens to me, you should go find her. If we ever get separated, go to Fogg and find Gnat. She'll take care of you. You know….if."

No. She wouldn't say it.

Because there was always a choice.

And Astrid _chose_ to believe Gnat was okay. It was the only way she knew how to feel...sane. It was the only way she knew how to live with herself. Freckles could go home anytime.

...right?

There was no way Freckles knew what it was to take a life. Dragons killed people, she knew that, but not Freckles. Never her. "I don't want you to leave," she confessed. She'd said this before, countless times, but it had never sounded so much like a prayer. "Please...don't leave me," she begged. "You're my best friend. And I know I don't deserve you. You're…you're good, Freckles," she said confidently, the most assured she'd felt all day. Her gaze lifted to follow the light of the crescent moon. "I wish I could say the same for me."

Freckles looked up at her, the sky reflected in her eyes, and smiled.

"But I can only try," and to her surprise, she managed to smile back.

She tossed her fish back in the ocean and promised to start fresh when the sun rose.

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 _a/n: hello! This took a long time because I'm a goddamn fool and I broke three of my fingers on my favorite hand, plus this chapter was a lot of descriptive writing and I'm the type of writer that relies a lot on dialogue. So this was quite the challenge! I wanted this to be a lot longer because I typically like chapters to be the same length because I want everything to be neat and tidy and the same, but I didn't want to bore you and put unnecessary…..flourish, I suppose. I know this chapter is probably already super boring, but I wanted to give a daily taste of Astrid and Freckles lives and how they live day to day to showcase how close they are. The next chapter will really pick up, we'll see some more familiar faces. Please please bear with me, so many of you have left such lovely comments and I hope that this story continues to delight you! Please tell me what you think and as always thank you for your support ahead of time, your words are very dear to me!_


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